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CORRESPONDENCE 



BETWEEN 



THE RIGHT REV. BISHOP DOANE 



OF NEW JERSEY, 



AND 



THE REV. H. A. BOARDMAN 



OF PHILADELPHIA, 



ON THE 



ALLEGED POPISH CHARACTER 



OF THE 



"OXFORD DIVINITY." 







PHILADELPHIA: 
HOOKER & AGNEW, 

IS. W. CORNER OF CHESTNUT AND FIFTH STREETS, 



1841. 



6<n 






Wia. S. Young, Printer. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



The " Banner of the Cross," (a Protestant 
Episcopal paper, published in this city,) of 
the 20th Feb., contained a letter addressed to 
the undersigned, under the signature of the 
Right Rev. Dr. Doane, Bishop of New Jer- 
sey. This letter will be found below. My 
first letter in reply was sent to the Editor 
of the "Banner" on Tuesday morning, and, 
to my great surprise, he returned it to me on 
the afternoon of the same day, enclosed in 
a note, a copy of which is herewith published, 
marked (A.) The next morning, I trans- 
mitted to the editor the note marked (B.,) 
and soon after received his final reply, (C.) 

This statement will explain the reason 
why the following correspondence is pub- 
lished in the present form. It is proper to 
add, that my answer to the Bishop is consi- 
derably longer than I should have felt at li- 
berty to make it, had the editor of the " Ban- 
ner " agreed to insert it in his paper. 

H. A. BOARDMAN. 

Philadelphia, March 3d, 1841. 



(A.) 



(Note from the Editor op the Banner to Mr 
boardman, re urning m b j s. first letter 
to Bishop Doane.) 

In returning the enclosed to Mr. Boardman, the Editor 
of the Banner would merely remark in explanation, thai, 
it does not appear altogether relevant to the subject of 
controversy. Bishop Doane did not doubt, he pre- 
sumes, that Mr. B. would be able to "sustain" his 
charge against the Oxford writers, by quoting similar 
accusations by others; but this would scarcely be deemed 
exculpatory in a Court of Justice, and the Editor is un- 
willing to fill his columns, to the exclusion of better 
matter, with the notions of partisan writers, adopted 
without investigation, and maintained with a rancour un- 
worthy of the Christianity they profess. A bare allusion 
to the support which Mr. B. derives from the admission 
of Episcopal writers, would, the Editor conceives, be all 
that was required on this point, and this would lead at 
once to, what is now made the second division of his 
reply, — the result of his own investigation. This, the 
Editor will insert with pleasure, and will notify his read- 
ers that Mr. B's.. answer may be expected in the number 
next succeeding, if this course will be agreeable to Mr„ 
Boardman. 

The Editor would, further state, that a copy of the 
Banner containing Bishop Doane's Letter was particu- 
larly directed by the Bishop to be sent to Mr. Board- 
man, and instructions were given to that effect. 

1 



( 6 ) 

(B.) 

To the Editor of the "Banner of the Cross" 
Sir: 

I can hardly express my surprise at the tenor of the 
note I received from you last evening. I must think that 
your refusal to publish my letter, has been hasty and in- 
considerate ; and I wish to give you an opportunity to 
review the circumstances of the case. 

You inserted in your paper of last week, a letter from 
one of the Right Reverend Prelates of your Church, in 
which (addressing me by name) he says : "/" call upon 
you distinctly and by name for your proofs, that a large 
and learned body of the clergy of the Church of England, 
(embracing the leading ecclesiastical teachers at the an- 
cient University of Oxford,) have returned to some of 
the worst errors of Popery, and are employing both the 
pulpit and the press with prodigious efficiency to give 
them currency among the people." 

In other parts of his letter he distinctly intimates that 
if I fail to substantiate this statement, (and another found- 
ed on it,) very grave imputations will rest upon my cha- 
racter. 

I undertake to sustain the proposition; and on sending 
you the first part of my reply to the Bishop's peremp- 
tory call, I find your columns closed against me ! Why? 
Not because there is any thing exceptionable in the 
language or tone of my communication. This is not 
pretended. You brand as " rancorous " the spirit of some 
of the respectable clergymen of your own communion, 
whose opinions are quoted by me, but you do not even 
hint that I have violated the decorum proper to such a 
correspondence. "Why then is my letter rejected? Be- 



( ■> ) 

cause, in the first place, " it does not appear (to you) 
altogether relevant to the subject of controversy;" and in 
the second place, you are " unwilling to fill your columns, 
to the exclusion of better matter," with my quotations 
from Protestant Episcopal and Roman Catholic authors. 
As to the latter of these reasons, the public will be 
able to pronounce on its validity when they see the 
names of the men whom you characterize as manifesting 
a spirit "unworthy of the Christianity they profess,' ' 
and compare with this correspondence, the extracts I 
have taken from their writings. In reference to the other 
reason, it appears to me to be founded on a very extra- 
ordinary view of the Editorial prerogative. I design no 
offence, sir, when I respectfully remind you that the par- 
ties to this correspondence are Bishop Doane and myself; 
and I cannot recognise your right, or that of any other 
individual, to prescribe to me in what manner my part 
in it shall be conducted. Your plan may be a wiser and 
better one than mine ; but I must be allowed to act for 
myself. I do not join issue with you on the question 
as to the "relevancy" of my answer. I do not admit 
your right to raise this question (as a bar to the publica- 
tion of my letter.) Had the Bishop and myself consti- 
tuted you the umpire in this discussion, with plenary 
powers, you would have been authorized to exclude all 
such matter, on either side, as appeared to you irrelevant. 
But surely when you spread his letter before the Church 
and the world, you did not imagine that the questions 
presented in it were to be adjudicated before the bar of 
your private judgment: and I cannot consent to have 
them issued at that bar now. I choose that the same tri- 
bunal before which I have been cited, shall hear my de- 
fence. If I injure my own cause by introducing irrele- 
vant matter, the responsibility is mine, not yours. And 
I am utterly unable to see with what justice or propriety 



( 8 ) 

you can undertake to preclude me from using matter 
which I may deem of great weight in the argument. You 
have permitted me to be called to account in your co- 
lumns, and when I present my vindication, you refuse to 
publish a large portion of it, because you "do not deem 
it relevant to the subject of controversy!" 

As to the courtesy of this procedure towards a clergy- 
man of a different denomination from your own, (and 
whose reputation must unavoidably suffer from it among 
the numerous readers of your paper to whom he is a 
stranger,) I have not a word to say. But is it Chris- 
tian? Is it equitable? Is it just? Would you be satis- 
fied with it if you were placed in my circumstances? Do 
you not perceive, will not all who read this correspon- 
dence perceive, that it would be but one step further (and 
that a small one) for you to claim the right to dictate the 
precise terms in which my letter should be couched? 

I think, sir, I have reason to complain of this treat" 
ment. I do complain of it. I know how impartial men, 
of all denominations, will regard it. I greatly mistake 
the temper of the Protestant Episcopal portion of this 
community, (among whom I am happy to number a large 
circle of valued friends,) if they sanction it. Nay, I do 
not believe that the Bishop of New Jersey will approve 
of it. The tone of his letter to me, and his character as 
a man, forbid the idea that he would justify any third 
person in interfering with our correspondence, and sup- 
pressing a portion of my reply to him which I regard as 
vital to the merits of the case. 

You will gather from these remarks my answer to 
the inquiry contained in the latter part of your note. You 
wish to know whether you shall announce my reply (that 
is, the second part of it, which, you insist, ought to be 
the whole,) as forthcoming in the Banner of next week. 
By no means, unless you publish the first part. I shall 



( 9 ) 

probably have occasion to quote from other Protestant 
Episcopal Prelates and Pastors in that portion of my re- 
ply, and what guarantee have I that you would not 
deem my future quotations as irrelevant as those you 
have rejected, and shut them out of your columns also? 
My whole reply to Bishop Doane must be inserted in the 
Banner, or none at all. 

If you still decline publishing the letter, you will- do 
me the justice, I hope, to insert the enclosed Card in 
your paper of this week. I will wait for your final an- 
swer (both as regards the letter and the card,) until nine 
o'clock to-morrow morning. If I get no answer by that 
time, I shall consider it as importing that neither the let- 
ter nor the card will appear. 

I am sir, very respectfully, 

Yours, <fec, 
H. A. BOARDMAN. 

Philadelphia, Feb. 24th, 1841. 

(The " Card" referred to above, was as follows.) 

A CARD. 

The undersigned presents his compliments to the 
Right Reverend Bishop Doane, and begs leave to inform 
him, that the first part of his reply to the Bishop's letter 
in the Banner of the Cross of last week, on the subject 
of the Oxford Tracts, was sent to the office of the Banner 
on Tuesday morning, the 23d inst.; and that the Editor 
refused to insert it on these grounds, (as stated in his 
note,) to wit : — First, that " it did not appear to him (the 
Editor) altogether relevant to the subject of controversy;" 
and secondly, that he was "unwilling to fill his columns, 
to the exclusion of better matter," with certain quota- 
tions imbodied in the letter, from Protestant Episcopal 
and Roman Catholic authors. The undersigned being 



( io ) 

thus most unexpectedly, and, as he conceives, unjustly? 
precluded from replying (except under very unreasonable 
restrictions) through the columns of the paper in which 
he was personally and peremptorily invited to the dis- 
cussion, will do himself the honour to communicate his 
answer to the Bishop through some other channel. 

H. A. BOARDMAN, 

Philadelphia, Feb. 24th, 1841. 



(C.) 

The Editor of the Banner presents his compliments to 
the Rev. Mr. Boardman, and will publish, with pleasure, 
the Card which he addresses to Bishop Doane. 

The Editor has no desire to interpose any obstacle to 
the fullest vindication of himself by Mr. Boardman, and 
cannot think that he does so in adhering to the decision 
announced in his note of yesterday. That note was 
written in haste, and is perhaps susceptible of a misin- 
terpretation which Mr. Boardman has put upon it. — The 
word "rancour" was not intended to be applied to the 
gentlemen named in Mr. B's. reply, so much as to the 
opponents of the Oxford writers generally. 

The Editor would be sorry if the course which he has 
deemed it proper to pursue in this matter should be 
construed into any want of respect for Mr. Boardman, 
whose character he has ever held in high estimation. 



( 11 ) 



CORRESPONDENCE. 



BISHOP DOANE'S LETTER. 

TO THE REV. H. A. BOARDMAN, "PASTOR OF THE WALNUT 
STREET PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH," PHILADELPHIA. 

Reverend Sir, 

Though I cannot elaim the pleasure of your personal 
acquaintance, I feel myself compelled, in justice to the 
truth, and to the character of brethren and fellow-mem- 
hers of a sister Church assailed by you, to intrude myself 
on your attention. A little book, bearing your name, "a 
Lecture," delivered by you on the 27th day of December 
last, has just come into my hands, not by purchase, but 
as the gift of one of the publishers. Opening it cursorily, 
this morning, I am shocked to find, on pages 20 and 21, 
such language as this: — " These facts are sufficiently 
startling, but there is another feature in the present reli- 
gious state of Great Britain, equally ominous, namely, 
The Oxford Tract movement. Romanism could make 
little headway in that country if the ministry of the 
established Church were all such men as Bickersteth, 
and Melville, and Henry Blunt, and the Noels. But, 
unhappily, a large and learned body of the clergy, (em- 
bracing the leading ecclesiastical teachers at the ancient 
University of Oxford) have returned to some of the worst 
errors of Popery; and are employing both the pulpit and 
the press with prodigious efficiency, to give them cur- 



( 12 ) 

rency among the people. This state of things in England, 
must operate powerfully upon this country. The increase 
of Romanism there can hardly fail of giving a fresh im- 
pulse to it here. The Oxford Tract leaven is already 
beginning to work in our cities ; and Roman Priests are 
publicly felicitating their people on the progress their 
doctrines are making in the bosom of a Protestant 
Church." 

Your position in the community forbids the supposi- 
tion that you can under-estimate the value of reputation, 
and especially to "the clergy," and "ecclesiastical 
teachers." The office which you hold, as " Pastor of 
the Church" in which these words were uttered, is 
accepted as a sufficient pledge that you would not will- 
ingly depreciate, but from the clearest sense of duty, 
what you must allow to be so valuable: valuable, in the 
instances alluded to, not to the parties spoken of alone 
or chiefly, but to the cause of which they are the accre- 
dited advocates ; the cause of Him whose ministers they 
are. I set aside* then, as impossible, the thought that 
these grave charges were prompted by one particle of 
malice; or that they are uttered, however much they 
may betray the want of due consideration, in any feeling 
of uncharitableness. I throw myself on the less offen- 
sive, because less' culpable supposition, that the words 
which I have quoted were words not duly weighed ; 
spoken in the fervour of excited zeal, on grounds not 
thoroughly investigated. And in entire frankness and 
courtesy, I wish to afford you an opportunity to recon- 
sider them ; and should you find them not sustained, as 
most assuredly they cannot be, to do what your sense of 
justice will, I trust, instinctively demand of you, and 
your Christian charity, rejoicing not in iniquity, but re- 
joicing in the truth, will hasten to perform — acknowledge 
that you were in error, and make utmost and immediate 
reparation. 



( 13 ) 

That there may be no doubt as to my meaning, and 
that the present communication may suffice to bring 
about the only object which I have at heart, the accord- 
ance of what is due to others — and not less, permit me 
to add, of what is due to yourself — I call upon you dis- 
tinctly and by name for your proofs, that "a large and 
learned body of the clergy" of the Church of England, 
f " embracing the leading ecclesiastical teachers at the 
ancient University of Oxford) have returned to some of 
the worst errors of Popery, and are employing both the 
pulpit and the press with prodigious efficiency to give 
them currency among the people." 

Your reference to " the state of things " in this coun- 
try is more guarded. By " the Oxford Tract leaven," 
however, I must suppose you to mean, from the con- 
nexion in which you use it, the adoption of " some of the 
worst errors of Popery :" more especially, as you state 
that the " Roman Priests " are publicly felicitating their 
people on the progress their doctrines are making in the 
bosom of a Protestant Church;" by which you mean, 
doubtless, the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United 
States of America. Adopting this interpretation of your 
language, I call on you distinctly and by name for your 
proofs of the adoption of u some of the worst errors of 
Popery " into " the bosom " of that Church; and of the 
progress in it of any " doctrines " which, in your judg- 
ment, would justly authorize the " Roman Priests," as 
such, in reality, as well as "publicly, felicitating their 
people" I say really, for I am sure you are not igno- 
rant of the devices of Popery ; how she adapts herself to 
times and circumstances, taking cameleon-like the hue of 
every hour, yet all the while in purpose and intent un- 
changing and unchangeable ; how skilful and how prompt 
she is in that old trick of tyrants, to divide and conquer ; 
nay, how she has put on the very face and garb of Puri- 
2 



( 14 ) 

tanism,* that she might undermine, what she most dreads 
and hates, the Church of England, and the truth as held 
by her. 

In thus addressing you, I undertake no championship 
of what you are pleased to call " the Oxford Tract move- 
ment," as such; claiming, however, for myself the pri- 
vilege to use and to approve, without permission and 
without reproach, (responsible for that alone which I 
adopt,) the vast amount, that is most timely and most 
excellent, in those calumniated writings. As little do I 
identify myself with any school or set of men, on either 
side of the Atlantic : although the names of those whom 
you have charged as striving to pervert their age to 
Popery, while they profess to stand upon the ground 
which Cranmer held at his life's cost, the ground of 
primitive antiquity, are such, for talents, learning, piety, 
integrity, holiness, heavenly-mindedness and charity, 
as would adorn the purest age the Church has ever 
known ; and are — the Papists know it, though you do 
not — the boldest and the ablest living champions of the 
truth, against the force and fraud of fallen, frenzied Rome. 
I do no more than claim the application of that golden 
rule of mutual duty, which the Saviour taught us, in de- 
manding, as I would that others should for me, revisal of 

* See a note to the very able article, " Romanism in Ireland,'' 
written, without a doubt, at Oxford, in the Quarterly Review, No. 
cxxxiii. The statement there made, that Romish priests did go 
to England, in 1546, and thereabouts, disguised as Presbyterians, 
Independents and Anabaptists, by order from Rome ; and did 
teach the people, in these assumed characters, as Faithful Co- 
menin, one of the most active of them confessed, to hate the 
liturgy, to pray extempore, to despise ceremonies, to profess ten- 
der consciences, and to call a set form of words the mass trans- 
lated, is familiar to all well-informed Churchmen. A sufficient 
reference for the present, is to Strype's Life of Archbishop Parker, 
vol. i. pp. 141,459,484. 



1 



( 15 ) 

the sentence, which, without a proper hearing, has been 
passed upon the innocent and absent. Nay, less, far less 
than this. I do but act on the indignant prompting of a 
heathen's sense of justice : 

" absentem qui rodit amicum; 



Qui non defendit, alio culpante ; 

hie niger est, hunc tu Romane, caveto." 

Believe me, truly and respectfully, your friend and 
servant, G. W. Doane. 

Riverside, February 13, 1841. 



( 16 ) 



REPLY, 



LETTER L 

To the Right Rev. George W. Doane, D. D., 
Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church 
in the dlocess op new jersey. 

Right Reverend Sir: 

In the "Banner of the Cross" of the 20th 
instant, (for a copy of which I am indebted to the 
courtesy of a friend,) I find a letter addressed to me 
under your signature. It appears from this letter, that 
your feelings have been greatly wounded, and even 
" shocked," by a passage in relation to the Oxford 
Tracts, which occurs in my recently published " Lec- 
ture on Romanism/' And you call upon me either 
to retract or substantiate the sentiments there ex- 
pressed — sentiments which, you feel assured, must 
have been uttered " in the fervour of excited zeal, on 
grounds not thoroughly investigated." You do me 
the justice to disclaim any apprehension that these 
" charges " (as you characterize them) were prompt- 
ed by the least feeling of " malice " or " uncharitable - 
ness." I trust I am incapable of calumniating any 
one — much less could I " assail, " with malicious in- 
tent, the reputation of men holding (like the gentle- 
men at Oxford) a high and responsible situation in a 



( 17 ) 

sister-branch (sit venia verbo) of the church of Christ. 
And it is a source of unaffected regret to me, that the 
remarks alluded to should have given pain to my re- 
spected correspondent, or any other human being. 

The passage in the Lecture which bears upon this 
subject is as follows : — 

"These facts [namely, certain statistical facts quoted 
from Mr. Bickersteth, on the alarming increase of 
Popery in Great Britain,] are sufficiently startling; 
but there is another feature in the present religious 
state of Great Britain, equally ominous, namely, the 
Oxford Tract movement. Romanism could make 
little headway in that country, if the ministry of the 
established church were all such men as Bickersteth, 
and Melville, and Henry Blunt, and the Noels. But, 
unhappily, a large and learned body of the clergy 
(embracing the leading ecclesiastical teachers at the 
ancient University of Oxford,) have returned to some 
of the worst errors of Popery, and are employing 
both the pulpit and the press, with prodigious effi- 
ciency, to give them currency among the people. 

"This state of things in England [the state of 
things disclosed in the above paragraph, and in the 
quotation from Mr. Bickersteth,] must operate pow- 
erfully upon this country. The increase of Roman- 
ism there, can hardly fail of giving a fresh impulse 
to it here. The Oxford Tract leaven is already be- 
ginning to work in our cities^ and Roman Priests 
are publicly felicitating their people on the progress 
their doctrines are making in the bosom of a Protes- 
tant church." 

To these paragraphs is appended the following, 

3* 



( 18 ) 

foot-note, which I regret you did not copy into your 
letter, as it modifies somewhat the impression which 
the text is adapted to produce. 

"True Protestants of all denominations must re- 
joice at the emphatic condemnation which has been 
passed upon these publications by the eloquent Bishop 
of Ohio, and other distinguished clergymen of the 
Protestant Episcopal Church in this country. This 
opposition (the lecturer has been happy to learn since 
the lecture was delivered,) is likely to keep the cir- 
culation of these pernicious writings within very nar- 
row limits." 

You avow it as one of the objects of your letter to 
" afford me an opportunity to reconsider " these stric- 
tures, that I may thereupon acknowledge that they 
are unfounded, and " make utmost and immediate re- 
paration." 

I beg leave to assure you, Reverend Sir, that you 
are mistaken in supposing that the above passage was 
penned " without due consideration." It was writ- 
ten (and written not in anger but in sorrow,) after 
mature reflection. Nevertheless, the possibility that I 
might have wronged the authors of those publications, 
(a wrong I should be as prompt to atone for, when 
discovered, as any friend of theirs could be to demand 
"reparation,") has induced me, on your suggestion, 
to "reconsider" the whole subject, and reinvestigate 
the grounds on which the statements were made. I 
have examined the Oxford publications anew, (as 
many of them, that is, as are within my reach,) and I 
am only strengthened in the opinions on which you 
have animadverted. It is my sober, deliberate judg- 
ment, that those publications imbody " some of the 



( 19 ) 

worst errors of Popery/ ' and that the whole system 
is more Popish than it is Protestant. And I believe, 
(claiming for myself the same liberty of opinion that 
I concede to others,) that Oxfordism, instead of pre- 
paring true Christianity for its approaching conflict 
with "the man of sin," is destined greatly to accele- 
rate the progress of Romanism in England. 

Alluding to the writers in question, you observe, 
near the close of your letter ; " they are — the Papists 
know it, though you do not — the boldest and the ablest 
living champions of the truth, against the force and 
fraud of fallen, frenzied Rome." The remarks just 
made will confirm you (if confirmation were wanting) 
in the propriety of ascribing to me the ignorance as- 
sociated with my name in this sentence. I certainly 
66 do not know " what you affirm. I do not believe 
that any set of men can withstand Rome successfully, 
who have thrown away the weapons with which the 
Reformers vanquished her — who have spiked their 
cannon, and abandoned their citadel, and gone forth 
to meet her with small swords and pistols. Nor do 
I think that the Papists themselves are as well in- 
formed on this point as you suppose them to be. I 
have serious doubts whether the name of Oxford 
spreads more terror through the halls of the Vatican, 
than any other name in Christendom. But of this 
more presently. 

The main question between us respects the alleged 
Popish character (in some particulars) of the Oxford 
publications. It is obvious both from the opening 
and the close of your letter, that you consider the va- 
rious points adverted to by you, as subordinate to this. 
And every candid reader of the passage quoted from 



( 20 ) 

my lecture, will perceive at once that the whole ques- 
tion hinges here. To this point, therefore, I shall di- 
rect my chief attention. After making two prelimi- 
nary remarks, I will proceed to spread before you 
some of the grounds on which the statements in the 
lecture rest. 

In the first place, it is important we should define 
what is to be understood by the phrase, " some of the 
worst errors of Popery." There may be a differ- 
ence of opinion on this point. Some may hold that 
the Papal supremacy, the schismatic position of the 
church of Rome within the diocesses of the church 
of England, the denial of the cup to the laity, &c. 
&c, are the worst features of Romanism. But the 
author of the lecture had his eye upon what he 
deemed to be errors of a much deeper dye. He be- 
lieves with the judicious Hooker, that "the grand 
question that hangeth in controversy between us and 
Rome, is about the matter of Justifying Righteous- 
ness." With this may be associated the nature 
and means of regeneration, and the nature and 
true desert of sin. The doctrines of Rome on 
these and their affiliated points, together with her re- 
jection of the Bible as the only infallible Rule of 
Faith, are, in the judgment of the writer, her "worst 
errors" — the prolific source of nearly all her abomina- 
tions. 

My second remark is this: — If you were "shocked" 
at the sentiments expressed in my lecture, I was sur- 
prised beyond measure that you should treat the im- 
putation they involve against the character of the Ox- 
ford Divinity, as though it were a novelty. I cannot 
think it was so designed; but the legitimate impres- 



( 21 ) 

sion conveyed by the whole tone of your letter, is, 
that I am the first individual who has presumed to 
ascribe to these Tracts a strong Popish tendency ! In 
a matter of this sort, I neither court responsibility nor 
shrink from it. But it is right that the readers of this 
correspondence should know (if they do not know 
it) that these Tracts have been, and still are, the sub- 
ject of a wide-spread and vigorous controversy, both in 
the established church of England and in the Protest- 
ant Episcopal church in this country; and that they 
have been denounced for their Popery in terms of 
solemn and indignant rebuke, by many of the ablest 
pastors and Prelates in each of these churches. 

I propose to show now, that I have the authority 
both of Protestant Episcopalians and Roman Catholics, 
for all that I have said respecting the character of the 
Oxford publications; and having done this, I will then 
appeal to the Tracts themselves. 

I begin by quoting a single sentence from the no- 
ble work of Bishop M'llvaine of Ohio, on " Oxford 
Divinity." " He (the author) is constrained to say, 
that every further step of insight into what is indeed 
a thoroughly wrought, highly complex, and deep-laid 
scheme or system of doctrine, (much as the name of 
system is rejected by its advocates,) has produced but 
a deeper and deeper conviction on his mind, that 
whatever the intention or supposition of those who 
maintain it, it is a systematic abandonment of the 
vital and distinguishing principles of the Protestant 
faith, and a systematic adoption of that very root and 
heart of Romanism, whence has issued the life of all 
its ramified corruptions and deformities." (P. 14.) 

The esteemed Rector of St. Andrew's church, in 



( 22 ) 

this city, writing from Oxford, in 1838, says, "From 
all that I have learned since I have been here, after 
very free conversations with some holding the new 
divinity, and others who reject it, I am constrained to 
think that Messrs. Pusey, Newman, and Keble have 
started a system which, when brought out in full de- 
velopment, will be found to contain all the elements 
of Popery:' (Clark's " Glimpses of the Old World." 
Vol. II., p. 207.) 

The author just named quotes (Vol. II., p. 58,) the 
Rev. Josiah Pratt, the biographer of Cecil, as remark- 
ing to him, that he " had attentively read the ' Tracts 
for the Times,' and could come to no other conclu- 
sion than that this new theology was nothing more 
nor less, than the exploded errors of Popery re- 
vived" 

Mr. Bickersteth, in his introduction to the " Tes- 
timony of the Reformers," makes this observation 
respecting the Oxford writers: — "With much learn- 
ing and study of the Fathers, with great apparent, and, 
doubtless, in some cases real devotion, and a devoted- 
ness ascetic and peculiar, they seem to the author, as 
far as he has seen and known their course, to open 
another door to that land of darkness and shadow of 
death, where the " man of sin reigns." 

You remark in your letter, that the Oxford writers 
" profess to stand upon the ground which Cranmer 
held at his life's cost, the ground of primitive anti- 
quity," &c. Mr. Clark, in his account of them, says, 
" The Reformation, some of them speak of as a pro- 
digious evil; and they scout Cranmer and Ridley, 
and those other English Reformers who shed their 



( 23 ) 

blood for the truth, as innovators who are not to be 
listened to." (Vol. II, p. 49.) 

On the 48th page of the same work, there is an ex- 
tract from a sermon by the Hon. and Rev. Baptist 
W. Noel, which the author heard. Alluding to the 
Oxfordists, Mr. Noel said " there were a spirit and a 
class of men springing up within the bounds of their 
own communion, that if allowed to prevail, would 
bring back some of the worst errors of Popery — 
men who were the avowed apologists of the Romish 
church, and who spake of that corrupt body, as e our 
venerable sister/ — as * Christ's most holy fold' 
What ! (said he) is that e our venerable sister ' and 
< Christ's most holy fold,' which God has denomi- 
nated ' Babylon, the habitation of devils — the hold 
of every foul spirit — a cage of every unclean and hate- 
ful bird ;' and in reference to whom God says, 6 Come 
out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of 
her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues?' 
Is that i our most venerable sister,' and ' Christ's most 
holy fold,' which God denominates i Anti-Christ' — 
' the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth?' " 

I might quote numerous passages to the same effect, 
from the (London) Christian Observer — a periodical 
which, as every intelligent Episcopalian knows, has 
sustained itseli with singular consistency, ability? 
and devotion to the cause of truth and holiness, for 
forty years, and which has spoken fearlessly and so- 
lemnly on the subject of this new divinity. 

But I waive this, and close my first class of testi- 
monies, with the following extract from an article in 
the Episcopal Recorder of April 25th, 1840, under 
the signature of " Warburton," (generally understood 



( 24 ) 

to be the Rev. Dr. Beasley ) :— " They (the Tracts) 
decidedly maintain the doctrine of the real presence 
and a real sacrifice in the eucharist, which, if not so 
monstrous an absurdity, is scarcely less objectionable 
than transubstantiation; recommend the offering of 
prayers for the faithful dead, as efficacious in producing 
an amelioration of their condition; and establish prin- 
ciples which lead to the necessity of a more refined 
purgatory than that of Rome. In imitation of Po- 
pery, they attribute a magical and miraculous influ- 
ence to external ordinances, especially that of Bap- 
tism; transcend all Protestant opinions concerning the 
authority and prerogatives of the clergy; strike from 
the code of our church that fundamental tenet of jus- 
tification by faith, and obscure the hopes and sap the 
confidence of Christians, by attributing an undue in- 
fluence to the efficacy of works and external rites and 
ceremonies, thereby limiting the extent and blurring 
the truth of that great cardinal doctrine of our religion, 
that our salvation is the free gift of God through 
Christ, and the sole purchase of the Saviour's suffer- 
ings and death They would, like the Pharisees 

of old and the Romanists in the present day, intro- 
duce among us a wearisome and barren routine of ex- 
ternal observances, loading men's shoulders with a 

burden too heavy to be borne Finally, so 

strongly are the sentiments tinctured with Popery, 
and so close is the approximation to which they would 
bring us to that corrupt and abominable system, that 
they would have us, like Romanists, imitating apes 
and monkeys in our public services, bowing perpetu- 
ally at the name of Jesus, and upon our approaches to 
the altar, turning to the east when we kneel in prayer, 



( 25 ) 

tracing the sign of the cross upon public or private 
occasions, and soiling our beautiful, various, and sub- 
lime liturgy with more copious extracts from those 
" precious relics of antiquity/' Roman breviaries and 
missals; and, to complete our filial assimilation to the 
Romish church, instituting associations of nuns and 
sisters of charity like the Romanists, an ascetical or- 
der of the ministry, an order devoted to celibacy, and 
given to the austerities of monastic and cenobitic life." 

" Warburton " then goes on to show, that if " the 
plan projected by these writers was completely car- 
ried into execution," the Protestant Episcopal Church 
would be very little removed from " the decayed and 
putrid system of Popery." 

Such, Sir, are some of the Protestant Episcopal au- 
thorities I rely upon for sustaining the account given 
in my lecture, of the Oxford Tracts. 

I will now show that, however the Oxford gentle- 
men may consider themselves as the most successful 
opposers of Popery, they are viewed in a very diffe- 
rent light by Romanists. 

In a Roman Catholic paper now before me, dated 
January 2d, 1841, 1 find part of a speech delivered at 
a recent repeal meeting in Ireland, by the Rev. Mr. 
Hughes, a Romish priest. I quote from it a single 
sentence: "I hold (he says) in my possession the 
works of Dr. Pusey ; and were I to be concerned in a 
discussion on religion, I would not desire to be fur- 
nished with better works, replete with Catholic au- 
thorities and Catholic arguments, than the writings of 
Dr. Pusey." 

In another part of the same paper, there is this item 
of intelligence. " On the 3d instant, at Bruges, Bel- 



( 26 ) 

gium, a young (English) gentleman named Biden, so- 
lemnly abjured the Protestant religion, and embraced 
the Catholic faith. Jin attentive perusal of the 
writings of Dr. Pusey, was the immediate cause 
of his conversion." (I learn from another paper that 
two months after his conversion, " he entered a novi- 
tiate of the society of Jesus/') 

The following passage from a periodical, published 
at Rome (two years ago,) will show with what feel- 
ings the ' Oxford Tract movement ' is regarded at the 
head-quarters of the Hierarchy : — 

"The attention of all good Catholics, and espe- 
cially of the congregation for the propagation of the 
faith, cannot be enough excited by the present state 
of religion in England, in consequence of the new 
doctrine propagated with so much ability and success, 
by Messrs. Newman, Pusey, and Keble, with argu- 
ments drawn from the holy fathers, of which they 
have just undertaken a new edition (translation) in 
English. These gentlemen labour to restore the an- 
cient Catholic liturgy — the breviary, (which many of 
them, to the knowledge of the writer, recite daily,) 
fastings, the monastic life, and many other religious 
practices. Moreover, they teach the insufficiency of 
the Bible, as a rule of faith — the necessitv of tradition, 
and of ecclesiastical authority — the real presence — 
prayers for the dead — the use of images — the priests' 
power of absolution — the sacrifice of the mass — the 
devotion to the virgin, and many other Catholic doc- 
trines, in such sort as to leave but little difference be- 
tween their opinions and the true faith, and which 
difference becomes less and less every day. Faith- 
ful ! redouble your prayers, that these happy disposi- 
tions may be increased !" 



( 27 ) 

Such are some of the Roman Catholic testimonies, 
to which I feel authorized to appeal in vindicating the 
obnoxious passage in my lecture from the strictures 
passed upon it. 

Whether I am right or wrong, then, in my estimate 
of the Oxford publications, I am sustained both by Ro- 
manists and Protestant Episcopalians of high repute, 
in affirming that their authors have "returned to some 
of the worst errors of Popery." The question still 
remains, whether I am also sustained in this allega- 
tion by the Tracts themselves. This question I pro- 
pose, if Providence permit, to consider in another let- 
ter. I sincerely regret that I am obliged to trouble 
you with so prolix an answer ; but the terms of your 
call upon me were such, that I could not deem it 
either respectful to you or just to the grave subject 
which has occasioned our correspondence, to respond 
to your requisition, without entering into some details. 

I remain, Right Reverend Sir, 
With much respect, 

Your friend and servant, 

H. A. BOARDMAN. 

Philad., Feb. 22d, 1841. 



( 28 ) 



LETTER II 

To the Right Rev. Geo. W. Doane, D. D., Bishof 
of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the 

Diocess of New Jersey. 

Right Rev. Sir: 

Before proceeding to examine the Oxford publi- 
cations, I beg leave to make two or three introduc- 
tory observations on topics noticed in your letter, or 
suggested by it. 

I find in your letter an eloquent passage on the char- 
acters of the Oxford writers, as men of distinguished 
"talents, learning, piety, integrity, holiness, heavenly 
mindedness, and charity." This is a point I do 
not care to discuss. If it were proper, I could easily 
cite other opinions, from Protestant Episcopal sources, 
in which few of these qualities (in any eminent de- 
gree,) are conceded to them, besides the first two 
named in your panegyric. And I believe some chari- 
tably disposed persons have found no small dif- 
ficulty in conceiving how men of such exalted " in- 
tegrity " and C6 holiness/' could suffer their subscrip- 
tion to the Thirty-nine Articles to stand uncancelled, 
while they are publishing such sentiments as those 
advocated in the tracts. But this is an unpleasant 
subject, and I pass it. 

You remark, again, that there is in these writings 
"a vast amount (of matter) that is most timely and. 
most excellent." On this point we shall have no 



( 29 ) 

controversy. No men could delve as long and as la- 
boriously as these gentlemen have among the ancient 
fathers and the early divines of the English Church, 
without bringing up some fine samples of gold and 
gems. But this only renders their writings the more 
dangerous. For (if you will allow an illustration from 
a writer* who, I perceive, is in high repute at Oxford, 
just now, and whose folio happened to be lying on 
my table when your letter reached me,) " to eat figs, 
or other more cordial food, with the infusion of subtle 
and deadly poison, exempts not men's bodies from 
danger." If arsenic is to be mingled with the repast, 
the less inviting it is made to the palate the better. 
Had these tracts contained fewer good things, the bad 
would have been less widely circulated and more 
cautiously received. Let the wheat be winnow- 
ed from the chaff — the truth separated from the 
error, and published in separate volumes, and how 
many among those who now purchase the whole, 
would buy the volume of heresy? 

And this suggests another topic. The advocates 
of the tracts have often complained that they were 
condemned by individuals who had merely examined 
isolated extracts. I admit that this is not the fairest 
way to form an opinion of any work : I am fully con- 
vinced that it is not, of these publications. Whatever 
may have been the experience of others, I can say 
for myself, that I had no conception of the mischief 
they were calculated to do, until I examined them in 
detail. The quotations from them I had read, had 
left a deep impression upon my mind of their dan- 

* Dr. Thomas Jackson. 
3* 



( 30 ) 

gerous tendency; but this impression became tenfold 
stronger, when I came to explore the system as a 
whole. The good and the evil must be seen in their 
juxta-position and mutual dependence, before the evil 
can be adequately appreciated. 

The foregoing observations imply that there is 
something peculiar in the ivay in which Romanism 
is taught in these writings. Whoever expects to find 
it openly and systematically inculcated in them, will 
be disappointed. Nothing can be more ingenious or 
subtle than the principle on which the controversy 
with Popery is managed. Some points of it, as, for 
example, the supremacy of the Pontiff, the schismati- 
cal position of the Romish church in its relation to 
the " Anglo-Catholic church," transubstantiation, &c, 
they attack manfully: one broadside follows another, 
until the reader really begins to fancy they are the 
boldest of all the " champions " who have entered 
the lists against that antichristian hierarchy. But on 
other points, you will frequently find the case be- 
tween Rome and Protestant Christendom, stated in a 
way much more favourable to the Papist than the 
Protestant: it is not so much asserted as insinuated, 
that Rome has the best of it. Precisely as you will 
sometimes hear a judge, in summing up a case, though 
professing to present both sides to the jury, give the 
whole weight of his opinion in favour of one of the 
parties, yet in so covert a way that the adverse party 
cannot charge him with having decided it. In other 
passages, you feel sure you are approaching, step by 
step, an explicit avowal of some rank Popish tenet. 
But just as you fancy you have reached the point, and 
hasten to the next sentence to seize on the develop- 



( 31 ) 

ment, the writer turns off to indulge in some vague 
generalities or to caution you against premature 
judging in a case where so venerable a father as this 
one or that one has spoken doubtingly. Again, you 
are confident, after reading a sentence, that there is 
Popery in it ; but when you return to lay hold of it, 
it eludes your grasp. "They are (to use the lan- 
guage of the London ( Christian Observer,') so seho- 
lastically constructed, that when the obvious bearing 
of a passage or tract is shown to be open to objection, 
there is some little qualifying word in a corner, which 
an ordinary reader would never discover, to ward off 
the full weight of an honest reply to the passage in 
its true spirit." It may be that these "traps for cri- 
tics," have not been noticed by my Right Rev. cor- 
respondent: but many persons have an idea that the 
tracts abound with them. 

One of the first characteristics of the Oxford 
writings which will strike an unsophisticated Pro- 
testant as indicating a strong Popish tendency, is the 
extraordinary language in which the Romish and 
Protestant Churches are respectively spoken of, — 
the former being usually mentioned with marked de- 
ference and kindness, the latter with arrogance and 
severity. Indeed, these gentlemen repudiate the 
names, " Protestant," and " Protestant Episcopalian,' 9 
as descriptive of the Church of England; and unchurch 
all other Protestant denominations with as little cere- 
mony as was ever used by " Holy Mother " herself. 
Let me cite a few passages: — 

" The English Church, as such, is not Protestant, 
only politically, that is, externally, or so far as it has 
been made an establishment, and subjected to national 



( 32 ) 

and foreign influences. It claims to be merely Re- 
formed, not Protestant, and it repudiates any fellow- 
ship (!) with the mixed multitude Which crowd to- 
gether, whether at home or abroad, under a mere po- 
litical banner." (Tract 71, p. 21, N. Y. Ed.) 

" Of all combinations, that of Protestant Episcopal 

is the least pleasant It may seem harsh 

thus to speak of ' Episcopacy ' and ' Episcopalian/ 
yet we hope it will not shock any one, if we say that 
we wish the words, as denoting an opinion and its 
maintenance, never had been invented. They have 
done great mischief to their own cause. We are 6 of 
the church/ not * of the Episcopal church / our bish- 
ops are not merely an order in her organization, but 
the principle of her continuance, and to call ourselves 
Episcopalians, is to imply that we differ from the 
mass of dissenters mainly in church government and 
form, in a matter of doctrine merely, not of fact, 
whereas the difference is, that we are here and they 
there: we in the church, and they out of it."* 

* British Critic, Vol. 26, pp. 340, 341: Article on " the Ame- 
rican Church." I make no apology for quoting from this peri- 
odical in this connexion, as it is now an acknowledged organ of 
the Oxford Divines, and is, therefore, equally legitimate proof 
with the Tracts themselves, in illustrating what is denominated 
in the obnoxious paragraph in my Lecture, "the Oxford Tract 
movement." I find also in the " Banner of the Cross," of the 
6th Feb. (one week before the publication of your letter,) a glow- 
ing tribute to the character of the "Critic," which, with your 
permission, I will append to this note as a further warrant for the 
free use I may make of the work in this correspondence. It is 
as follows: — 

For the Banner of the Cross. 

Dear Mr. Editor, 
It has been among my warmest wishes, that a publisher might 



( 33 ) 

" So far from its being a strange thing that Pro 
testant sects are not l in Christ ■ in the same fulness 
that we are, it is more accordant to the scheme of the 
world that they should lie between us and heathenism." 
(Tract 47, p. 335.) 

The Oxford School are, it is believed, the first set 
of men, not avowedly Papists, who have deplored the 
glorious Reformation as a calamity. They are not 
quite as explicit on this point (and many others) 
now, as as they probably will be hereafter. One of 
them, however, the late Rev. Richard H. Froude, a 
favourite pupil of Mr. Newman's, and who is highly 
praised by the British Critic, did not hesitate to cha- 
racterize that work, as " the detestable Reformation!" 
And the British Critic of Jan. 1840, speaks of " the 
impieties of the 16th century" in obvious allusion to 
the same event. 

be found who would give to the clergy and laity of our churches, 
and to all lovers of high intellect, embued with primitive piety 
and consecrated at the altar of the Holy One, an American edi- 
tion of this ablest of all the British periodicals, at a price acces- 
sible to all. I rejoice to say that better even than that is to be 
done. Wiley and Putnam, of New York, will import the British 
Critic, (two annual volumes of 500 pages each, in quarterly num- 
bers,) if one hundred persons order it. It is an opportunity most 
auspicious to the best interests of theology and literature, and I 
venture, in my zealous desire for its success, to call the attention 
of my brethren to it under my own name. I speak advisedly, 
for I have been a subscriber to it from the commencement of the 
present series, and the whole set, now twenty-eight volumes, 
are on the shelves of my library, and among its choicest contents. 
It should be in the hands of every clergyman, and should circu- 
late in every parish. 

Faithfully, your friend, 

G. W. Doane. 
Riverside, 30th Jan. 1841. 



( 34 ) 

As these writers have usurped for their own com- 
munion a title to which they have no paramount 
right, and which they are willing to share only with 
Rome, so their favourite appellatives for Protestant 
Christianity are, " Ultra-Protestantism," and " the 
New Religion/' 

It is superfluous for me to remind you, after these 
testimonies, that the Oxfordists scout the idea that the 
Papal power is the great "apostacy" and "Anti- 
christ" of Prophecy. The Protestant world has, up to 
the rise of these writers, been, in the main, united on 
this point. The corner-stone of the Reformation was 
laid on the doctrine, that the Papal Church is Anti- 
christ. This was maintained by all the Reformers, 
Continental and British; it was incorporated in the 
creeds and symbols of the reformed churches; it is 
asserted by your church in her Homilies, by the Irish 
church in her Articles, (Vide Art. lxxx.,) .by the 
Presbyterian church in her Confession; and it has 
been held by the great body of able critics and com- 
mentators down to the present time, including the 
very learned Mede, Brightman, Cressener, Sir Isaac 
Newton, Bishops Newton and Hurd, Wm. Lowth, 
Dr. H. More, Vitringa, Pyle, Dr. S. Clark, and many 
others. It is now discovered at Oxford that all Pro- 
testant Christendom has been at fault on this point 
for three hundred years. 

Dr. Pusey, in his letter to the Bishop of Oxford, 
says, (speaking ironically,) " It is Popery and disaf- 
fection to our church to doubt whether the Pope is 
the Antichrist, though Antichrist himself be not yet 
revealed, nor may we yet know when or among whom 
he will appear." And the British Critic, in the No. 



1 



( 35 ) 

for last October, lays it down as " a most true and 
most important position," that " the prophecies con- 
cerning Antichrist are yet unfulfilled and that the 
predicted enemy of the church is yet to come." This 
is precisely the Romish doctrine. Whether the re- 
viewers would go another step, and with Leo X. for- 
bid any clergyman to " explain futurity or the times 
of Antichrist, under pain of excommunication," does 
not appear. One of the chief reasons which predis- 
pose these gentlemen to adopt the theory of Anti- 
christ just stated, must be regarded as very curious 
by Protestant Episcopalians. They urge that their 
own church is so closely associated with the church 
of Rome, that the charge of Antichrist against the lat- 
ter necessarily involves the former also. If this be 
true, the English Reformers were strangely reckless 
of the reputation and safety of the church they died 
for; for Latimer in prison, and Ridley in his farewell 
letter, and Cranmer (whom you so justly commend,) 
at the stake, declared "the Pope to be Antichrist;" 
and with them agreed Bradford, and Hooper, Frith, 
and Tyndale, and others of that noble company of 
martyrs — men of whom the world was not worthy, 
and whose names are not so much the property of 
your church as the common heritage of Christendom. 
Should the martyrs happen to be right and the Ox- 
ford theologians wrong, do they run no hazard who 
would link the destinies of the church of England 
with those of Papal Rome? 

But these gentlemen go still further. They not 
only deny that the Romish church is Antichrist, but 
maintain that the fact of a church being called Anti- 
christ, is a presumptive proof rather that it is a branch 



( 36 ) 

&f the true church ! The logic by which this conclu- 
sion is reached, is worthy of the cause. But not to 
spend time in analyzing it — who does not see the 
bearing of this apparent determination to uphold 
Rome at all hazards? If that church be not Anti- 
christ, the Reformation was wrong; for on this ground 
it was undertaken and carried through. And if the 
Reformation was wrong, Protestants are all schisma- 
tics and are bound to return to the true fold. Thus 
Rome argues. And thus Oxford argues — the differ- 
ence being here. Rome includes the church of 
England among her schismatical children, while Ox- 
ford contends that she, and she alone — " the Anglo- 
Catholic church," — enjoys "the apostolical succes- 
sion" equally with her " venerable sister,"* and that 
Rome, not England, is responsible for perpetuating 
the schism. So that at Rome, all are guilty of schism: 
and at Oxford all are guilty of schism ; but it is only 
the Protestant sects who are dissevered from the true 
church. — Did the "Catholic Herald" of this city, 
speak at random when it said, not long ago, that " if 
the principles of the Oxford school had prevailed in 

* A writer in the No. of the " Banner " which contains your 
letter to me, speaks of the Protestant Episcopal Church, or the 
" American Branch of the Anglo-Catholic Church," as the " el- 
der sister " of the church of Rome. It would be presumptuous 
for a Presbyterian to hazard an opinion on this delicate question 
of seniority; " Non nostrum . . . tantas componere lites !" But 
if I may be allowed a remark on this subject, I would suggest 
that there is a simple and scriptural method of eluding this ques- 
tion altogether; namely, by declaring with the Homilies that the 
church of Rome is no sister at all of the church of England, but 
"Antichrist,'' and " Babylon." (See the Homi lfes on Obedience, 
and Peril of Idolatry, and Sermon against Wilful Rebellion.) 



( 37 ) 

the 16th century, there would have been no schism" 
— that is, no Reformation ? 

But these writers have not merely withdrawn the 
charge of Antichrist against Rome : they speak of her 
in terms which make one rejoice that they have re- 
nounced the name of " Protestants." Thus, in Tract 
71, pp. 25, 26, they call the Papal church their " La- 
tin sister," and say, 

" Speak gently of our sister's fall: 
Who knows but gentle love 
May win her at our patient call, 
The surer way to prove."* — {Christian Year.) 

Again : " This warning is especially seasonable to 
Us of this day who are beset both with the clamour 
that e the Bible and the Bible only is the religion of 
Protestants,' and with a thousand discordant views, 
all professedly scriptural, in illustration of its unrea- 
sonableness Whatever be our private differ- 
ences with the Roman Catholics, we may join with 
them in condemning Socinians, Baptists, Indepen- 
dents, Quakers, and the like. But God forbid that 
we should ally ourselves with the offspring of heresy 
and schism in our contest with any branches of the 

* It is curious to a by-stander, to notice how these gentle assi- 
duities are received by the " erring sister." As yet, although 
a good many bland words have been spoken, she manifests no 
disposition to recognise the tie of consanguinity so ambitiously 
pressed upon her attention by the theologians of Oxford. Dr. 
Wiseman, the ablest of her living defenders, in a late article on 
the subject, waiving the question as to the validity of the ordina- 
tions of the English church, denies that her Bishops have any 
just claim to apostolic jurisdiction, and contends that the obliga- 
tion still lies on the laity to be in connexion with the Roman 
Hierarchy : but she may yet concede to policy, on this point, 
what her pride has hitherto withheld. 
4 



( 38 ) 

Holy Church which maintain the foundation, what- 
ever may be their incidental corruptions." (Tracts 
Vol. I., p. 603.) 

Are the men who utter this language to be regard- 
ed as the " boldest champions " of the day, " against 
the force and fraud of Rome?" Men who spurn all 
alliance with any and every (for this is the idea) Pro- 
testant denomination as " the offspring of heresy and 
schism " — whose contest with "the Holy church " of 
Rome involves only some "private differences " — 
and who characterize the arrogance and ambition, the 
falsehood and cruelty, the usurpations and heresies, 
the awful idolatries and blasphemies of that church, 
(a church which your Homilies brand as "the spoiler 

AND DESTROYER OF THE CHURCH," and " THE BABY- 
LONIAN Beast of Rome,") as mere " incidental cor* 
ruptions?" Alas for Protestantism, and Christianity 
too, if their championship has fallen into such hands! 
Sure I am, that every true Protestant will exclaim, 
"Non tali auxilio!" 

I cannot forbear adding another sentence or two 
from the British Critic. " It was most touching news 
(says a late No.) to be told, as we were lately, that 
Christians on the Continent were praying together 
for the spiritual well-being of England. We are their 
debtors thereby. May the prayer return abundantly 
into their own bosom," &c. What does this allude to? 
Unquestionably to the fact announced in the papers, 
but not by the reviewers, that the "Christians" 
at Rome, encouraged by the signs of the times, have 
set apart a stated season to pray for the conversion 
of England to Popery! This was "most touching 
news " to the divines of Oxford. 



( 39 ) 

Again, in the article on " the American Church " 
already referred to, the reviewers congratulate them- 
selves that " the church of Rome is daily acquiring 
a more powerful hold upon the public mind, [in 
the United States,] since it is better to belong to any 
portion of the one true church, than to sectaries, who, 
not to dwell on their doctrines, do not even profess 
to belong to it." The plain English of this is, that 
they would rather see Popery increase in this coun- 
try, than Protestantism— except as the latter is con- 
nected with a single one of our numerous denomina- 
tions. Does this indicate their noble championship 
against Rome? 

I beg you not to fancy that these passages excite 
any personal feeling in my breast, because I have 
the infelicity to be attached to one of these no-church 
organizations. I assure you that Protestants, (a name 
we cling to as cordially as our assailants spurn it,) 
are as little alarmed by these solemn excommuni- 
cations, as Queen Elizabeth was by the " Damnatory 
Bull " of Pius V. Men who have heard the thun- 
ders of the Vatican unmoved, for three centuries, 
are not likely to be frightened by the poor imitation 
(the stage-thunder) they are getting up at Oxford. 
We mourn, indeed, to see so much arrogance asso- 
ciated with such lofty pretensions to "heavenly- 
mindedness and charity." We cannot avoid contrast- 
ing with the spirit these writers are fomenting, the 
harmony which prevailed between their predecessors 
and the Presbyterian Reformers of the Continent, 
when your favourite Cranmer " had Bucer called to 
Cambridge and Martyr to Oxford, to teach theo- 
logy:" and when (at a later period) "Laud [the idol 



( 40 ) 

of the Tractists] was formally reproved by the TJni- 
versity of Oxford, for maintaining that there could 
be no true church without Bishops." The spirit of 
those days, we are happy to believe, still pervades a 
large part of the English Church and its daughter 
in this country. There are multitudes in both 
branches of the church, among her clergy and laity, 
who will acquiesce in the indignant rebuke pro- 
nounced by the Christian Observer upon the senti- 
ments of the Tracts on this point: "We thank God 
that such is not the doctrine of the Church of Eng- 
land. Our most eminent divines, in her true spirit, 
have blessed God for our own exalted privileges, 
without unchurching other communions." 

I think the statements which have now been pre- 
sented, must satisfy every candid mind, that the Ox- 
ford school, with whatever ability or zeal they may 
controvert some of the Popish dogmas, have a very 
hearty antipathy to Protestant Christianity and an 
equally hearty sympathy for the Church of Rome. 

Reserving what I have to say further, for another 
letter, (for the subject grows upon my hands,) \ 
renew, Right Rev. Sir, the assurances of my respect 
and consideration, and remain, 

Your friend and servant, 

H. A. BOARDMAN. 
Philadelphia, March 1st, 1841. 



( 41 ) 



LETTER III. 

To the Right Rev. Geo. W. Doane, D. D., Bishop 
of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the 
Diocess of New Jersey. 

Right Rev. Sir: 

An able writer belonging to your own church, 
has very happily described the Oxford system as " a 
Religion of Sacraments" This designation de- 
notes at once its affiliation to Popery, and furnishes 
a clue by which the uninitiated may thread its mys- 
teries. 

" The church (we are told by the Tractists,) is the 
store-house and direct channel of grace — an ordi- 
nance which conveys secret strength and life to 
every one who shares in it, unless there be some 
actual moral impediment in his own mind." (Intro- 
duction to Pusey on Baptism, p. 4. ) On the next 
page the following passage occurs : — 

" Rationalistic, or (as they may more properly be 
called) carnal notions concerning the sacraments, 
and on the other hand, a superstitious apprehension 
of resting in them, and a slowness to believe the pos- 
sibility of God's having literally blessed ordinances 
with invisible power, have, alas! infected a large 
mass of men in our communion. Hence, we have 
almost embraced the doctrine, that God conveys 

grace only through the instrumentality of the mental 

4* 



( 42 ) 

energies, that is, through faith, prayer, active spirit- 
ual contemplations or [what is called!] communion 
with God, in contradiction to the primitive view, 
according to which, the church and her sacraments 
are the ordained and direct visible means of convey- 
ing to the soul what is in itself supernatural and un- 
seen. For example, would not most men maintain, 
on the first view of the subject, that to administer 
the Lord's Supper to infants, or to the dying and 
apparently insensible, however consistently pious 
and believing in their past lives, must be, under all 
circumstances, and in every conceivable case, a su- 
perstition ? Jind yet neither practice is without 
the sanction of primitive usage. And does not this 
account for the prevailing indisposition to admit that 
Baptism conveys regeneration? Indeed, this may 
be set down as the essence of sectarian doctrine 
(however its mischief may be restrained or compen- 
sated, in the case of individuals,) to consider faith 
and not the sacraments as the proper instrument of 
justification and other gospel gifts; instead of holding 
that the grace of Christ comes to us altogether from 
without, (as from him, so through externals of his 
ordaining,) faith being but the sine qua non, the ne- 
cessary condition, for duly receiving it." 

It is intimated in the first part of this passage, that 
the common doctrine is, that grace is conveyed u only 
through the instrumentality of faith, prayer," &c. 
This is an error. Protestants have never excluded 
the sacraments from the "means of grace." They 
admit that spiritual regeneration may accompany 
baptism ; but they deny that it is inseparably linked 
with it. They admit that the Lord's Supper may 



( 43 ) 

impart spiritual edification, strength, and comfort, 
to the communicant: but they deny that it does this 
except (as your church teaches) he feeds in his 
heart by faith with thanksgiving. 

The sentences I have italicised in the above quo- 
tation, disclose, I presume, the real sentiments of 
these writers, on the nature of the sacraments. I 
have met with no grosser representation of the opus 
operatum efficacy of the sacraments, in Romish au- 
thors, than is presented here. Indeed, the Catechism 
of the Council of Trent (see p. 227, Baltimore ed.) 
refers to the practice of some in the early church 
who gave the eucharist to infants; and, instead of 
sanctioning the usage, as these writers seem to do, 
expresses its marked disapprobation of it; so that in 
this matter, Oxford has even exceeded Rome. 

The assertion near the close of the foregoing ex- 
tract, that " faith is not the instrument of justifica- 
tion," will surprise those who have been accustomed 
to the theology of the scriptures or of the XXXIX. 
Articles. 

Let me cite a few more passages to show that the 
Oxford religion is, like Popery, a sacramental reli- 
gion : — 

"Almighty God has said his Son's merits shall 
wash away all sin, and that they shall be conveyed 
to believers through the two sacraments." (Tract 4.) 

In Tract 76, after affirming that in baptism the 
soul receives a " new nature, adoption, the inheri- 
tance of heaven," &c, the writers say that there are 
certain points respecting which the Divines cited by 
them, differ, among which are these, to wit: "whe- 
ther grace be given in and through the water, or 



( 44 ) 

tonly contemporaneously with it:" and "whether or 
not baptism, besides washing away past sin, ad- 
mits into a state in which, for sins henceforth com- 
mitted, repentance stands in place of a sacrament, so 
as to ensure forgiveness without specific ordinance; 
or whether the holy eucharist is that ordinance; or 
whether the full and explicit absolution of sin after 
baptism is altogether put off till the day of judgment." 
I shall have occasion before closing this letter to call 
your attention to the unscriptural and gloomy doc- 
trine of Dr. Pusey in relation to one of these topics, 
namely, the possibility of forgiveness to those who 
" sin after baptism." As to the other topic, the Ox- 
ford writers are characteristically fond of "reserve" 
and mystery, adhering with great scrupulosity to the 
discreet maxim of Bishop Jebb, who observes in one 
of his letters ; " prematurity of effort is in all matters 
to be deprecated, but most of all in enunciating any 
part of our system :" — so that it is no easy thing to as- 
certain precisely whether they believe or not that the 
water in baptism becomes " impregnated with a spi- 
ritual property" so as to be the physical vehicle of 
conveying grace to the soul. The oracle, it may be 
anticipated, will utter its vaticinations on this and 
some other mysterious questions, with less ambiguity 
hereafter. But no response can surprise us, however 
gross, on this point, when we remember that Alex- 
ander Knox, the venerated father of Oxfordism, and 
who is so much lauded in the British Critic,* (lauded, 

* The Critic says of Mr. Knox, " He is an instance in rudi- 
ment of those great restorations which he foresaw in development. 
He shares with the eminent writers of the day, in the work of 
advancing what he anticipated," 



( 45. ) 

notwithstanding, as the Reviewers tell us, (vol. 23, p. 
3,) " the cross was not the central object of his di- 
vinity, but held a somewhat remote and subordinate 
position in his theological panorama/ 7 ) has laid down 
the doctrine of a transfusion of gracious qualities into 
the bread and wine of the eucharist, in the plainest 
terms. In one of his letters to Dr. Jebb, he says; 
" I do not know whether I have ever called your at- 
tention, to the two-fold evidence afforded by St. 
Paul's expressions, respecting the eucharist, that the 
consecrated symbols are not (as Dr. Waterland main- 
tains) the signs or pledges of a concomitant blessing, 
but (as the old church taught, and as Dr. Butt urges 
against Waterland) the actual vehicles through which 
that blessing is conveyed." Further on, comment- 
ing on the expression, " eateth and drinketh unwor- 
thily," he says, " the sacred things which he dese- 
crates, are mysteriously their own avengers. The 
divine virtue combined, by omnipotence, with the 
blessed and broken elements, for the purpose of 
transfusing life and health to the soul of the quali- 
fied receiver, in the case of profane reception, still 
no less manifests itself to be divine, but in a con- 
trary way, secundum modum recipientis." And 
again: "The ark [alluding to the death of Uzzah] 
could not, even by a figure of speech, be made the 
inflictor of punishment; but nothing was more na- 
tural than to make aliments which had received a 
divine property through the supernatural blessing 
of heaven, to become of themselves, as it were, the 
vehicle of curse to him, who so ate or drank as to 
blend sanctity with pollution." (Correspondence 
of Jebb and Knox, Letter 146.) 



( .46 ) 

This is not Popery precisely, I grant: but is tran- 
substantiation more revolting ? 

Writers who approximate so nearly to Rome in 
their views of the sacraments, (a subject to which I 
shall recur,) rival her, of course, in their notions of 
church-power and the authority of the clergy. They 
teach that a church episcopally organized " is the 
only way to eternal life;" that the church is "the 
channel of grace," its sacraments " the means by 
which justification and other gospel gifts are im- 
parted," and these sacraments (of course) only in the 
hands of the clergy who are in the line of apostolical 
succession, (to wit, the clergy of the English, Roman, 
and Greek churches.) The bishops have received 
(we are taught) in regular transmission from the 
apostles, not merely official rank and dignity, but in- 
ward grace, (" Episcopal grace," as Dr. Pusey calls 
it,) which they alone can impart to others. In vir- 
tue of this miraculous (shall I call it?) endowment, 
they have "power over the gifts of the Holy Ghost" 
and even (to some extent) " over the things of the 
unseen world." " They are armed with the power 
of the apostles, to confer spiritual gifts in the church, 
and, in cases of necessity, to wield their awful wea- 
pon of rejection from the fold of Christ." (Tract 5.) 
" This is faith, to look at things not as seen, but as 
unseen; to be as sure that the Bishop is Christ's re- 
presentative, as if we saw him work miracles, as St. 
Peter and St. Paul did. — I repeat, the bishops are 
apostles to us. — The meetingers [how very cour- 
teous !] have no head, they are all mixed together in 
a confused way. . . . He (the bishop) rules the whole 
church here below, as Christ, the true and eternal 



( 47 ) 

sovereign, rules it above. . . . He visibly chooses 
those whom Christ vouchsafes to choose invisibly, 
to serve in the word and sacraments of the church.' 7 
(Tract 10.) 

The "Christian Observer" may well ask, after 
quoting passages like these, " How long would the 
bishops be tolerated, . . . in a Protestant country, if 
any half* dozen of them should rise in their places^ 
and say of themselves what these Tracts say of them?" 
The only design with which I have introduced the 
above extracts, is, to show how Papistical these wri- 
ters are in their notions of the power of the priesthood. 
I think impartial men will agree that there is rank 
Popery in the doctrine here exhibited, however the 
Tractists may refuse to acknowledge the Pope's su- 
premacy. Where has Popery uttered any thing on 
this subject, more Popish than the sentiment of the 
Tracts, that " Episcopal authority is the very bond 
which unites Christians to each other and to Christ;" 
or of the British Critic, that " the effect of a sepa- 
rating from the bishop is a separating from Christ?" 
Why, after such language, do they tell us, that they 
do not mean to " exclude Presbyterians and others 
from salvation?" Why not meet the consequences 
of their doctrine like men, and tell the Protestant 
world, as the Jesuit Wilson told Dr. Potter, in the 
controversy which brought out Chillingworth's im- 
mortal work, (that work which the Oxfordists are 
trying so hard to " make of none effect, by their tra- 
ditions") that " Protestancy unrepented destroys sal- 
vation?" Why not carry out their principles, and 
affirm that the millions who have died in the com- 
munion of those reformed churches in Europe and 



( 48 ) 

America, which are not under prelatical organization, 
not having been " united to the Episcopal authority, 
Were not united to Christ," and so have gone down 
to perdition? 

The time has come when consistency demands 
that these gentlemen should " define their position " 
with a little more accuracy, on this and many other 
points. Protestants will then know where to find 
them, and Roman Catholics will cease to reproach 
them with "endeavouring to silence the voice of 
conscience by half measures." 

I had written thus far, when I received (very op- 
portunely) from a gentleman of this city, a London- 
derry paper of Jan. 6th, which contains an abridged 
report of a sermon preached on the 25th Dec. last, by 
Dr. Whately, the present Archbishop of Dublin, 
at the consecration of the new Bishop of Meath, in 
Christ Church, Dublin. It is pleasant to hear the 
Oxford coterie rebuked by a Prelate whose reputa- 
tion as a scholar and logician is co-extensive with the 
diffusion of English literature, and whose known 
principles place him above the imputation of belong- 
ing to that class in the Episcopal Church, sneeringly 
denominated by their opponents, "Evangelicals " I 
quote the following passage from the sermon : — 

" There is another class," observes the Archbishop, 
" who assert that the regulations and forms of the 
Christian church, which they have adopted, are to be 
found in the writings of the apostles, and the tradi- 
tions of the early church: and affirm that all who do 
not adopt these regulations, and entertain their views 
of church order, are not included in the Christian 
church. Such views seemed to him extremely danger- 



( 49 ) 

ous. The persons who held these sentiments 

REMOVED THE FOUNDATIONS OF THE CHURCH FROM 
THE ROCK ON WHICH THEY RESTED, AND PLACED 

them on the sand. Such were not the views held 
by those who framed the articles of our church; for 
they say that ' the visible church of Christ is a con- 
gregation of faithful men, in which the pure word of 
God is preached, and the sacraments be duly admi- 
nistered according to Christ's ordinance, in all those 
things that of necessity are requisite to the same." ? 
They clearly recognised the claim of every Christian 
community, who hold the great fundamental doc- 
trines of the gospel, and administer the ordinances 
instituted by Christ, to be called a church of Christ. 
While they claimed the right to ordain officers, and 
appoint rites tending to decency and good order, they 
put forward no exclusive claims. They claimed no 
sacramental virtue for the ordinances which they adminis- 
tered, on account of possessing the apostolical chain of 
succession, which, if one link he broken, the whole is de- 
stroyed. They merely claimed for themselves the 
title of being regularly ordained ministers of a serip- 
turally constituted church of Christ. Those who put 
forward any other claim were attempting to remove 
the foundation of the church, from the rock on which 
it has been built, to place it on the sand. If their ex- 
clusive principles were to be received, what would 
become of the other Christian churches, who did not 
adopt their views of church government and order? 
The persons who held such sentiments, and made 
these minor matters fundamental principles, were 
not only condemning themselves, but attempting to 
5 



( 50 ) 

write the sentence of condemnation against their own 
church. Such sentiments might be called Church of 
England principles, and the persons who held them 
might claim for themselves the title of high church- 
men: and they might consider that in pressing these 
opinions upon public attention, they were obtaining 
a greater reverence for the institutions and ministers 
of the church, but he conceived them fraught 
with danger to the church. They were merely 
successors to the apostles, in being ministers of a regu- 
larly constituted church, and in observing the ordinances 
of the gospel. Successors in any other sense the apos- 
tles had none. The Reformers put forward no exclusive 
claims. They did not regard those ivho did not belong 
to their church as excluded from the church of Christ. 
They kept the mean, and avoided all extremes. They 
pronounced no censure or condemnation upon those 
who differed from them." 

I have quoted in my first letter the sentiment of the 
judicious Hooker, that " the grand question that hang- 
eth in controversy between us and Rome, is about 
the matter of justifying righteousness," and have 
specified the Romish doctrine on this point, as " one 
of the worst errors of Popery." It would be super- 
fluous for me to remind my Right Reverend corres- 
pondent, that it has always been a vital question be- 
tween Protestants and Romanists, whether men are 
justified by the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ 
received and rested upon by faith, or by being made 
inwardly and subjectively righteous. The Protest- 
ant doctrine is, that justification and regeneration 
are inseparably associated, that is, that all who are 



{ 51 ) 

justified, are at the same time renewed and sanctified; 
but they deny that this personal holiness, which is 
eommunieated by the Holy Spirit in regeneration, con- 
stitutes any part of that righteousness on the ground 
of which, the sinner is pardoned and accepted of 
God. As our Saviour was " made sin " by having 
the sins of men legally imputed or reckoned to him 
(not transfused into him,) as their surety, so they 
are " made the righteousness of God," by having the 
Redeemer's righteousness (his perfect 'obedience unto 
death,') legally imputed to them — they receiving it by 
faith as the only ground of their hope. But I need 
iaot dwell on the distinction so explicitly recognised 
i-n the creeds and articles of all the reformed churches, 
between justification and sanetification. 

The Church of Rome confounds these gifts, and 
makes our sanctification or personal righteousness, the 
ground of our justification: — # The instrumental cause 
of our justification (says the Council of Trent,) is the 
sacrament of baptism, which is the sacrament of faith, 
without which no one can ever obtain justification: — 
the sole formal cause is the righteousness of God; 
not that by which he himself is righteous, but that 
by which he makes us righteous ; with which being- 
endued by him, we are renewed in the spirit of our 
mind, and are not only accounted righteous, but are 
properly called righteous, and are so, receiving right- 
eousness in ourselves," &c. This inward righteous- 
ness of course admits of increase, that is, justification 
is progressive, — as we read in the same decree : those 
who are the subjects of it, " by the observance of the 
commandments of God, &c, " gain an increase of that 
righteousness which was received by the grace of 
Christ, and are the more justified," 



( 52 ) 

On this doctrine Hooker remarks, " The church of 
Rome, in teaching justification by inherent grace, 
doth pervert the truth of Christ ; and by the hands 
of the apostles we have received otherwise than she 
teacheth." 

If I am asked to prove that the doctrine of the 
Tracts on this vital point is substantially that of 
Rome, I should be disposed to refer my interroga- 
tor to the truly apostolic work of Bishop M'llvaine 
on " Oxford Divinity " — that work which the Editor 
of the Churchman, in his paper of last week, charac- 
terizes (in the same breath in which he confesses he 
has never read it,) with so much classic grace and 
with such profound deference towards an eminent pre- 
late of his own church, as " the Romance of Gambier." 

In this book the proofs are spread out in detail. But 
as you may not have it in your library, I will quote 
a few of the passages cited in it from the Oxford wri- 
tings. 

Speaking of the distinction just adverted to, be- 
tween justification and renewal, Mr. Newman says, 
" This distinction is not scriptural." " In truth, scrip- 
ture speaks of but one gift, which it sometimes calls 
renewal, sometimes justification, according as it views 
it, passing to and fro, from one to the other, so rapid- 
ly, so abruptly, as to force upon us irresistibly the 
inference that they are really one?'' 

Again; he says, "Justification and salification are 
substantially the same thing; — parts of one gift; 
properties, qualities, or aspects of one." In another 
place he maintains "their identity in matter of fact, 
however we may vary our terms, or classify our 
ideas." 



1 



( 53 ) 

Again; " Cleanness of heart and spirit, obedience 
by word and deed, this alone can constitute our justi- 
fication/' " The gift of righteousness (for justifica- 
tion,) is not an imputation, but an inward work." " If 
He (God) counts righteous, it is by making righ- 
teous; if he justifies, it is by renewing." 

This indwelling righteousness, it seems, has even a 
satisfying and justifying quality in it, since he calls 
it, "The propitiation for our sins in God's sight." 

Again ; " Justification consists in God's inward 
presence" " It is the act of God imparting His di- 
vine presence to the soul, through baptism, and so 
making us the temples of the Holy Ghost." 

What will plain readers of the Bible say to the 
following passage ] " Christ's cross does not justify 
by being gazed at in faith, but by being actually set 
up within us, and that not by our act, but by God's 
invisible grace. Men sit and gaze and speak of the 
great atonement, and think this is appropriating it. 
Men say that faith is an apprehending and applying: 
faith cannot really apply it; man cannot make 
the Saviour of the world his own; the cross must be 
brought home to us not in word, but in power, and 
this is the work of the Spirit." 

The above extracts are from Mr. Newman's work 
on Justification. That they involve the idea of a 
progressive justification, must be apparent to every 
one ; but we are not left to gather this inferentially. 
Dr. Pusey, in his Letter to the Bishop of Oxford, 
says, "We are by baptism brought into a state of sal- 
vation or justification (for the words are thus far 
equivalent,) .... a state admitting of degrees ac-< 
cording to the degree of sanctificationP 



( 54 ) 

I could easily multiply these quotations, but can 
it be necessary ? Do not the above passages prove 
that these writers confound justification and sancti- 
fication, and, like the Romanists, advocate the doc- 
trine of " justification by inherent grace" and there* 
by (as Hooker says) "pervert the truth of Christ? " 
I am aware that in the face of numerous statements, 
like those that have been cited, they profess to u ex- 
clude sanctification from having any place in our 
justification;" and they may fancy that they really 
do this. I must refer you to their works for the 
subtle and (I must add) sophistical distinctions by 
which they seek to elude the imputation of teaching 
the Popish doctrine on " this grand article of our re- 
ligion," (the "articulus stantis vel cadentisecclesiae,") 
and to Bishop M'llvaine's work for a thorough sift- 
ing of these distinctions, in which they are scattered 
to the winds. But the readers of this correspondence 
may decide the question for themselves, by com- 
paring the quotations with the Romish doctrine as 
exhibited above from the decrees of the Council of 
Trent. It will, I am sure, be no easy matter to 
convince people of plain common sense, who have 
not been trained to the dialectics of the schools, that 
men who familiarly use language on this subject like 
that which has been quoted, are materially at variance 
with the Romish standards. Their affinity will be 
more apparent as we proceed. Meanwhile, I avail 
myself of the testimony of a witness whose compe- 
tency will be admitted on all hands, — Mr. Perceval, 
one of the Oxford Divines. This gentleman says, in 
a letter published in the London Record, Oct. 2d, 
1837, "Allowing certain explanations, there is no- 



( 55 ) 

thing in the Tridentine statements (about justifica- 
tion) which cannot fairly be reconciled with Gos- 
pel doctrine." Can the charge of Popery against 
this system be regarded as very uncharitable, when 
we hear one of its authors affirming that the Romish 
doctrine of justification is substantially sustained by 
Scripture ? But let us probe a little deeper. It will 
be found, if I mistake not, that there is a palpable 
coincidence between the Oxford and Roman systems 
in relation to the office of faith in justification. 

The Homilies of your Church say that "Faith is 
a sure trust of the mercy of God through Christ;" 
that it (< sends us to Christ, " "joins us to Christ/' 
"makes him our own, and applies his merits"* 
Hooker says, "This is the anly hand which putteth 
on Christ for justification." The Church of Rome 
teaches that baptism is "the only instrument of jus- 
tification." She distinguishes between the faith which 
is before, and that which is after baptism; denying 
that the former can be any other than a dead faith. 
Men are spiritually renewed by baptism, and until 
they are baptized, they cannot exercise " a justifying 
faith." She anathematizes those who affirm that 
"the ungodly is justified by faith only; " and those 
who maintain that "justifying faith is nothing else 
than confidence in the divine mercy by which sins 
are forgiven for Christ's sake; or that it is that con- 
fidence only by which we are justified." (See De- 
crees of the Council of Trent, on Justification, Can- 
ons 9 and 12.) In explaining how men are "justified 

* In a passage quoted above from Mr. Newman, lie says, speak- 
ing of the atonement, (! Faith cannot really apply it." 



( 56 ) 

by faith/' she says, (chapter VIII.) "we are said to 
be justified by faith, because faith is the beginning of 
human salvation, the foundation and root of all justi- 
fication : " — which it is " not because it apprehends 
the remission of sins through Christ, but because it 
excites the will to such motions or acts as are neces- 
sary to the obtaining of justification." Consequent- 
ly, (as Bishop M'llvaine remarks,) " it is in no sense 
a direct instrument of obtaining justification ; but 
only a sine qua non, a preparation, as the Trent 
Council says, 'without which it is impossible to 
please God.' " " Until baptism gives it some ad- 
ditional quality, it is a mere naked assent, a mere 
preparative for hope and charity, and all good works ; 
not a living faith, but still « divine ' as Gandolphy 
says, < because founded on the testimony of God.' " 

Let us now briefly compare with this doctrine the 
views of the Oxfordists. They have much to say 
about "justification by faith;" and those who are go- 
verned more by sound than sense, might at first sup- 
pose that they really believe with your articles on 
this point; but this is far from being the case. Keep- 
ing in view the Tridentine doctrine, let me invite 
your attention to the following statements: — 

"Faith, as gaining its virtue from baptism, is one thing 
before that sacred ordinance; another after." "Jus- 
tifying faith before baptism is not necessarily even a 
moral virtue, but when illuminated by love and enno- 
bled by the Spirit," (in baptism) " it is a name for 
all graces together." Before baptism, " it is without 
availing power, without life in the sight of God, as 
regards our justification," — that is, "as regards the 
indwelling of the Spirit," which is justification ac- 



1 



( 57 ) 

cording to this system. Until it is baptized, it is 
" full of terror and disquiet, vague, and dull-minded, 
feeble, sickly, wayward, fitful, inoperative," " nothing 
till Christ regenerate it" in baptism. "When it 

(faith) comes for baptism, it comes to the 

fount of life to be made alive, as the dry bones, in 
the Prophet's vision, were brought together in pre- 
paration for the breath of God to quicken them." 

"We are saved," says Dr. Pusey, "by faith bring- 
ing us to baptism, and by baptism God saves us" — 
"faith being but the sine qua non, the necessary 
condition on our parts for duly receiving the grace 
of Christ" — and " the sacraments, not faith, being the 
proper instrument of our justification." 

Again; "Faith," says Mr. Newman, "does not pre- 
cede justification; but justification precedes it, and 
makes it justifying. Baptism is the primary instru* 
ment, and creates faith to be what it is, and other- 
wise, is not, giving it power and rank, and constitur 
ting it as its own successor. Each has its own office; 
baptism at the time, faith ever after — the sacraments, 
the instrumental, faith the sustaining, cause." 

I might ask, in the view of these statements, what 
does your catechism (as quoted by the Bishop of 
Ohio) mean, when it requires of those who come to be 
baptized, "repentance whereby the) 7 " forsake sin, and 
faith whereby they steadfastly believe the promises 
of God made to them in that sacrament?" Is the 
faith here intended a " vague," "inoperative," "un- 
regenerate," "dead," faith? For these Oxford men 
tell us, that such is the faith which goes "before bap- 
tism." Was this the faith of Saul of Tarsus — of 



( 58 ) 

Lydia — of the jailor — of the three thousand — before 
they were " baptized ?" Was this the faith of the 
dying thief, who, as is evident, was never baptized? 
Is this the faith of all the godly of this and former 
ages, in the Church of Scotland, and most of the 
churches of the Continent and of the United States, 
who, according to the notion of these writers, 
have not received true baptism? But I waive these 
questions, and leave it for candid Episcopalians to 
decide, whether the passages that have been adduced, 
do not quadrate much better with the Romish stand- 
ards than with those of the Church of England. As 
to the standards of your church, however, I cannot 
forbear adding, that Dr. Pusey in his letter to the 
Bishop of Oxford, makes the very remarkable asser- 
tion, that your eleventh article, which is entitled, 
" The justification of man," " says nothing as to where- 
in our justification consists." That article I shall be 
excused for quoting:— 

" XL Of the Justification of Man. 

« We are accounted righteous before God, only for 
the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, by 
faith, and not for our own works or deservings. 
Wherefore, that we are justified by faith only, is a 
most wholesome doctrine and very full of comfort; 
as more largely is expressed in the Homily of Justi- 
fication." 

Is there nothing here " as to wherein our justifica- 
tion consists?" Does not this article (and still more 
the Homily, which it recognises as a faithful exposi- 
tion of itself,) set forth in express terms, the ground 
of our justification? And is it not as irreconcilable 



( 59 ) 

with the views quoted from Dr. Pusey and his asso- 
ciates, as it is with the dogmas of Popery ?* 

Justification and renewal are so confounded by 
these authors, that it is not easy to treat their views 
of either topic separately. But a few additional ob- 
servations may not be amiss here on their views of 
baptism. 

It is evident, from the passages already brought 
forward, that in their system there can be neither 
justification nor regeneration, nor saving faith, prior 
to baptism. Baptism is as much the sun and centre 
of their divinity, as "Christ and him crucified " was 
of the divinity of the apostles. It is the grand instru- 
ment by which men who are dead in trespasses and 
sins, are to be made alive, rebels restored to the favour 
of God, and this apostate world reclaimed from the 
countless evils of the fall. One would think, to 
hear them talk, that the New Testament must be a 
1 treatise on baptism — that baptism was the main topic 
of our Saviour's discourses, and the grand theme of 
the apostolic preaching — and that the great business 
of the ministry is, not to preach the Gospel, but to 
administer the ordinances. If this were the place it 
would be no difficult thing to show, that these gen- 
tlemen have no scripture warrant for thus exalting 
the sacraments at the expense of that ordinance 

* But it is worthy of observation (and has been noted by Bishop 
M'llvaine,) that this article does not contain a syllable about 
bajjtism, which these gentlemen and the Romanists hold, is the 
exclusive instrument of justification. .Nay, even the Homily to 
which it refers, contains but two short paragraphs in which bap- 
tism is named; " and in those passages, not one word about the 
penitent and believing but unbaptized adult, but only about chil- 
dren incapable of believing, and persons repenting after baptism. 
This is strange, indeed, if there be no justification without bap- 
tism." 



( 60 ) 

Which has been appointed as " the wisdom and power 
of God unto salvation," both to the Jew and the 
Greek — that when they assign so conspicuous a place 
to baptism and the Eucharist, and recommend that 
we should " keep back from some who are baptized 
the explicit and full declaration of the doctrine of the 
atonement ," (a thing which has drawn down upon 
them the just rebuke of their friend, the Bishop of 
Exeter, in his celebrated charge,) they inculcate 
" another Gospel " from that of the great apostle who 
said, "Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the 
Gospel." 

But let us appeal to the Romish doctrine, that, 
we may see whether we wrong these writers, in 
alleging that they ascribe (in coincidence with it) an 
opus operatum efficacy to baptism — an efficacy which 
is independent of the state of the recipient, provided 
only (to use Dr. Pusey's language) he "close not his 
own soul against God's gift." 

The Council of Trent anathematizes all who affirm 
that "grace is not always conferred by the sacra- 
ments, and upon all persons, so far as God is con- 
cerned, if they be rightly received, but that it is only 
bestowed sometimes and on some persons" — and all 
who affirm, that " grace is not conferred by the sa- 
craments by their own power, (ex opere operato.") 
Is not this doctrine laid down in the passages that 
have been cited from the Oxford writings ? Again, 
your twenty-seventh Article says, baptism "is a sign 
of regeneration or new birth — whereby the promises 
&c, are visibly signed and sealed." But Dr. Pusey 
says, " Baptism is not a sign, but the putting on of 
Christ — wherefore baptism is a thing most powerful 



( 61 ) 

and efficacious" "Powerful and efficacious," it is 
indeed, if (as these writers teach) no individual can 
exercise saving faith in the Redeemer, until he is bap- 
tized — ^if (as Mr. Newman maintains) (i baptism cre- 
ates faith to be what it is, and otherwise is not, giving 
it power and rank." 

I add a few more samples from the Tracts. " Bless- 
ed is the sacrament of water, in which, when cleansed, 
we are released from the sins of our original blind- 
ness, unto eternal life." "Is it not wonderful that 
even a bath should wash away death? Surely; but let 
us ever be the more ready to believe, if its marvel- 
lousness, forsooth, is made a reason for unbelief." 
" Not that we obtain the Holy Spirit in the water ; 
but, by being cleansed in the water from sin and guilt, 
we are prepared by the angel for the Holy Spirit." 
" Blessed is the water which cleanses once for all, 
which sinners cannot make light of, which receives 
no stain from the recurrence of defilement, so as to 
pollute those whom it washes." (Tertullian, quoted 
Tracts V., T. pp. 583-6.) Dr. Pusey earnestly main- 
tains that by baptism an individual receives " the 
forgiveness of sin and a new nature" and is " made a 
real child of God and a real member of Christ, not 
simply an outward member of an outward body of 
people called Christians." — This sounds very Popish 
to Protestant ears. Certain it is, that the doctrine 
presented in each of the foregoing extracts, is repudi- 
ated by the Protestant Episcopal Bishop of this Dio- 
cess, in his Essay on Regeneration. " We trust it 
will be perceived (says Bishop Onderdonk,) that in 
the statement of our doctrine, a perfect distinction has 
been made between baptism and the change of heart. 
6 



( 62 ) 

The spiritual operation in each of them is, indeed, 
called regeneration; but it should be remembered that 
there are t diversities of operations of the same Spi- 
rit,' and that some of his most conspicuous operations 
did not include a moral effect as inherent in them." — 
Further on, the Bishop speaks of " the theory that the 
seed of sanctification, the first principle or 'begin- 
ning of the spiritual life,' to grow or die subsequent- 
ly as the event may prove, is deposited by the Spirit 
in baptism, which deposite is regeneration." To this 
opinion, he says, "ive do not accede" And, subse- 
quently, " The result is that there is no evidence that 
moral influence, or the seed of it, is the grace of baptis- 
mal regeneration." 

But it is time to notice a kindred topic, which will 
in turn illustrate the one we have been considering, 
viz : the views of the Tractists respecting sin commit- 
ted after baptism. It must "shock" ordinary readers 
of the Bible to hear that it is a matter of great doubt, 
in the judgment of these writers, whether any provi- 
sion has been made in the glorious plan of redemption, 
for the remission of post-baptismal sins, and if any, 
where and what it is ! According to their scheme, sin 
after baptism ("mortal sin") destroys the virtue of the 
sacrament, and removes or cancels justification. Faith 
having now become dead again by sin, must be re- 
generated anew before it can become a second time 
the condition of justification. How then can the 
erring individual, in the case supposed, recover his 
justification ? His faith cannot act, being " unregene- 
rate." His baptism (by which his faith was origi- 
nally "created") cannot be repeated. The Church 
of Rome has provided for this exigency by the sa- 



( 63 ) 

crament of Penance, whereby a sins committed after 
baptism, are forgiven." But Oxford has not even this 
poor, unscriptural expedient, to relieve the con- 
science of a trembling, heavy-laden sinner: much 
less does she say to him, as an apostle said to such 
an one, " Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou 
shalt be saved." Far from this is her frigid and 
eheerless doctrine. " The Church (says Dr. Pusey) 
has no second baptism to give, and so she cannot 
pronounce him (the post-baptismal sinner) altogether 
free from his past sins. There are but two periods of 
absolute cleansing, baptism and the day of judg- 
ment." — Look, too, at the following: is it not humili- 
ating to think that such a passage could have been 
penned by a clergyman of the Church of England, — 
an expounder to dying, guilty men, of that blessed 
volume in which Ood has said, " Though your sins 
be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow ; though 
they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool ? " 
Dr. P., commenting on one of the articles, says, " But 
who truly repent ? When a man who has been guilty 
of sin after baptism may be satisfied that he is truly 
repentant for it ; whether and to what degree he should 
all his life continue his repentance for it; wherein 
his penitence should consist; whether continued re- 
pentance would efface the traces of sin in himself; whe- 
ther he might ever in this life look upon himself 
as restored to the state in which he had been, had 
he not committed it ; whether it affect the de- 
gree of his future bliss, or its effects be effaced by 
repentance, but their extinction depend upon the 
continued greatness of his repentance ; whether ces- 
sation of his active repentance may not bring back 



( 64 ) 

degrees of the sin upon him ; whether it shall appear 
again in the day of judgment ; these and the like are 
questions upon which the article does not speak." — 
This is indeed " Protestantism rejected and Popery- 
spoiled ! " Let him come back to Protestantism, or 
rather, I should say, to the Gospel with its "unsearch- 
able riches" of grace; or else let him go forward to 
Popery, and extricate himself from the meshes of the 
net in which he has entangled himself, by laying hold 
of her dogmas of penance and purgatory. Either 
course would grant him relief — either would be more 
consistent than to remain where he is— either would 
save him from the stern rebuke of your Homily of 
Repentance (as aptly quoted by Bishop M'llvaine,) 
which says ; " We do not without a just cause detest 
and abhor the damnable opinion of them which do 
most wickedly go about to persuade the simple and 
ignorant people, that if we chance, after we be once 
come to God and grafted into his Son, to fall into 
some horrible sin, repentance shall be unprofitable 
to us; there is no more hope of reconciliation, or to 
be received again into the favour and mercy of God." 
The Christian Observer quotes another passage, 
which exceeds in presumption any thing I remem- 
ber to have met with in the writings of even nomi- 
nal Protestants: — "The fountain (of the Redeemer's 
blood) has indeed been < opened for sin and unclean- 
ness,' but it were to abuse the power of the keys intrusted 
to us, (!) again (that is, after a first offence,) to pre- 
tend to admit them thus; — now there remains only the 
baptism of tears" "May God forgive men," adds 
the Observer, " who thus awfully presume to limit 
the virtue of the Redeemer's atonement; who sub- 
stitute the penance of tears for the blood of Christ. 



( 65 ) 

and who interpose between man and his God, to ad- 
mit, or shut out from the kingdom of heaven, as they 
see fit, just as the Popish priests did, to their own 
pontifical dignity and great gain, (though of this we 
accuse not the Oxford brethren,) till Luther spoiled 
TetzePs trade." 

On this point again they have been reproved by 
their friend the Bishop of Exeter, who is well known 
in England as an admirer of the Oxford writings. 
He quotes these statements from Dr. Pusey's work 
on baptism, to wit: " If after having been then washed, 
once for all, in Christ's blood, we again sin, there is 
no more such complete absolution in this life " — no 
restoration " to the same state of undisturbed security 
in which God had by baptism placed us:" and then 
adds, " These, and passages like these, however they 
may be explained, tend to rob the gospel of the blessed 
Jesus of much of that assurance of the riches of the 
goodness and mercy of God in Christ, which is its pe- 
culiar message — its glad tidings of great joy, "Come 
unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and 
I will give you rest." Our church teaches us to ap- 
ply this blessed promise to those who are "heavy 

laden" with sins committed after baptism 

Nor may we forget the tendency of such language, 
to encourage the pernicious and perilous habit of dis- 
tinguishing between such sins as may destroy our 
state of graee, and such as we may think still leave 
that state secure. Let it never be absent from our 
minds that every wilful sin is deadly — and let us be- 
ware of hardening our own hearts, and corrupting the 
hearts of our brethren — by whispering to ourselves 
or them, which sin is more or less deadly than others, 

6* 



( 66 ) 

That which we may deem the least, will be deadly- 
enough, if unrepented, to work our perdition,— those 
which we deem the most deadly, will, if repented, 
have been thoroughly washed away in the blood of 
our Redeemer." (Bishop of Exeter's Charge, deli- 
vered last spring.) 

The bishop was not "as one that beateth the air," 
when he penned the latter part of this fine passage. 
For another of "the worst errors of Popery" which 
pervades this system, is, the distinction of mortal 
and venial sins. God has taught us that "the 
wages of sin is death," and that all sin is deadly. 
The Roman Catholics deny this, and so do the Ox- 
fordists. Both teach, with the ancient Pagans, that 
there are two kinds of sins, mortal and venial. This 
is distinctly intimated by Dr. Pusey in the paragraph 
just quoted, but the following is more explicit — "A 
question, (says Dr. P.,) will probably occur to many ; 
what is that grievous sin after baptism, which in- 
volves the falling from grace ? what the distinction 
between lesser and greater — venial and mortal 
sins ? or if mortal sins be sins against the decalogue, 
as St. Augustine says, are they only the highest de- 
grees of those sins, or are they the lower also ? 
This question, as it is a very distressing one, I would 
gladly answer if I could or dared. But, as with re- 
gard to the sin against the Holy Ghost, so here also, 
Scripture is silent. I certainly, much as I have la- 
boured, have not yet been able to decide any thing. 
Perhaps it is, therefore, concealed, lest men's anxiety 
to hold onward to the avoiding of all sin, should wax 
cold. But now since the degree of venial iniqui- 
ty (!) if persevered in, is unknown, the eagerness to 



M 



( 67 ) 

make progress by more instant continuance in prayer 
is quickened, and the carefulness to make holy friends 
of the mammon of unrighteousness is not despised." — 
I know not what sort of a Protestant he must be who 
will assert that there is no Popery here. 

Indeed, sir, I can look upon the whole representa- 
tion of these writers, concerning "sins committed 
after baptism," only as a libel upon the Gospel. I 
find it difficult to trust my own senses when I see 
them challenging to themselves " a power over the 
gifts of the Holy Ghost/' as arrogant as that assumed 
by Rome herself, and then, with the Gospel in their 
hands, presuming to say to a fellow worm like them- 
selves, "You have sinned since you were baptized, and 
6 scripture is silent ' as to the means or even the possi- 
bility of your forgiveness. Henceforth there remains 
for you only the baptism of tears !" Is this Chris- 
tianity ? Is this the doctrine of that precious book 
which says, "The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth 
from all sin?" Away with such divinity! It is 
stamped, not with Popery merely, (for Popery is on 
this point far less revolting,) but with cruelty and 
impiety. It dishonours God, and brings chains and 
bondage instead of freedom and salvation to apostate, 
guilty man. Let its authors set up the cross where 
God has placed it, (and where they have supplanted it 
with the baptismal font,) in the centre of the glorious 
system of redemption ; and see then, whether there 
is " no balm in Gilead and no Physician there," for a 
sin-sick soul — whether the blood of Christ will prove 
as inadequate to " take away sin," as they confess 
their baptismal waters are. 

Closely allied to the dogma of mortal and venial 



( 6S ) 

sins, is that of purgatory; for it is easy to associate 
with the doctrine that there are no means provided 
in this world for cleansing those who have " sinned 
after baptism," the notion that some arrangement for 
this purpose may be provided hereafter. On this 
subject, again, the Tractists are reserved and enigma- 
tical. Sometimes they condemn the Romish doc- 
trine stoutly. But this seems to be aimed rather at 
its details than the principle of it. And the prevail- 
ing tone of their observations leaves the impression 
on the reader's mind, that their antipathy to the doc- 
trine is not so very bitter but that they might be per- 
suaded out of it. I will cite a passage or two. " The 
Creed of Pope Pius only says, ' I firmly hold that 
there is a purgatory, and that souls therein detained, 
are aided by the prayers of the faithful;' nothing 
being said of its being a place of punishment, no- 
thing or all but nothing, which does not admit of being 
explained of merely an intermediate state. Now, sup- 
posing we found ourselves (no very violent supposi- 
tion, by the way, for this writer,) in the Roman com- 
munion, of course it would be a great relief to find that 
we were not bound to believe more than this vague 
statement, nor should we, (I conceive,) on account of 
the received interpretation about purgatory superadd- 
ed to it, be obliged to leave our church;" (Tract 71, 
13.) Again, (Tract 79, p. 516,) we are told that, 
tl taken in the mere letter, there is little in it (the Ro- 
man doctrine of purgatory,) against which we shall 
be able to sustain formal objections." So also, (same 
Tract, p. 538,) commenting on the expression in 1 
Cor. iii. 15: "He shall be saved, yet so as by fire," 
they utter these ominous sayings : " Doubtless there is 



( 69 ) 

a mystery in the woidi fire as there is a mystery in the 
words day of judgment. Yet it any how has refer- 
ence to the instrument or process of judgment. And 
in this way the fathers seem to have understood the 
passage ; referring it to the last judgment, as Scrip- 
ture does, but at the same time religiously retain- 
ing the use of the word fire, as not affecting to inter- 
pret and dispense with what seems some mysterious econo- 
my, lest they should be wiser than what is written." 
To these I subjoin (from Bishop M'llvaine) the some- 
what bolder avowal of Mr. Newman. "Who can tell 
(says Mr. N., in his Parochial Sermons,) but in God's 
mercy, the time of waiting between death and Christ's 
coming may be profitable to those who have been his 
true servants here, as a time of maturing that fruit of 
grace, but partly found in them in this life, a school- 
time of contemplation, as this world is of discipline, 
of active service. Such, surely, is the force of the 
apostle's words, that 'He that hath begun a good 
work in you, will perform it until the day of Christ ' 
— not stopping at death, but carrying it into the resur- 
rection, — as if the interval between death and his 
coming was by no means to be omitted in the pro~ 
cess of our preparation for heaven." 

This theory lacks but one feature of purgatory, 
namely, suffering or discipline ; and as this is of great 
efficacy in this life, in " maturing the fruit of grace" in 
the hearts of Christians and "preparing them for hea- 
ven," there seems no good reason why the Oxfordists 
should not avail themselves of it in their purgatory, as 
well as the Romanists and the pagans in theirs. It will 
be no marvel if some future " Tract for the Times," 
should tell the members of the "Anglo-Catholic 



( ™ ) 

Church/' in no apocryphal terms, that their pious re- 
latives who have departed this life under the stain 
of "post-baptismal sin," are now undergoing that pro- 
cess by which, according to old Anchises, departed 
souls are purged from their remaining defilement and 
fitted for the Elysian fields : 

"Ergo exercentur poems, veterumque malorum 
Supplicia expendunt." 

If the Oxford writers are shy of confessing a purga- 
tory, no such diffidence can be imputed to them in 
reference to the practice of offering prayers for 
the dead. They cite various testimonies from the 
earfy fathers in support of this practice, and the Bri- 
tish Critic, I perceive, commends it as " truly aposto- 
lical" (I wish the Reviewers had pointed out the 
passage in the writings or lives of the apostles, which 
authorizes it.) I quote a single passage from several 
I had marked in Tract 77. 

"I would venture to ask .... whether (as Luther 
did) you have not prayed for the perfecting and in- 
creased blessedness of a departed friend or relation, 
even though you have subsequently checked your- 
self? whether you did not find a comfort from that 
prayer? and whether this dictate of human nature, 
warranted as it is by the early Church, and distinct 
from the Romish error, may not, after all, be im- 
planted by the God of nature — may not be the voice 
of God within us ? " (p. 412.) 

The Bishop of Exeter's comments on this subject 
will answer better than any I could make. " To state 
(he observes) that this practice is a matter of sacred 
consolation to those who feel themselves justified in 






( 71 ) 

entertaining it," — (and all, they seem to suggest, may 
1 feel themselves justified,' for <it is warranted by the 
early Church ') — to say, further, that "it is a solemn 
privilege to the mourner " — " a dictate of human na- 
ture" — nay, that "it may be implanted by the God 
of nature, may be the voice of God within us :" — to 
say all this, is surely "an encouragement" of the 
practice so characterized, which is very feebly coun- 
ter-balanced by their admitting that "our Church does 
not encourage it " — by their abstaining from in " any 
way inculcating it" — or even by their thinking 'it 
expedient to bring forward such a topic in public 
discussion.' "—The Bishop then goes on to show 
that the Church does discourage the practice; and he 
says he " cannot reconcile it with Christian discre- 
tion," or "understand what justification can be of- 
fered" by these gentlemen for expressing themselves 
as they have done about a practice which " has been 
deliberately, and for such grave reasons, repudiated 
by the Church herself." 

Another indication of the Popish tendency of this 
system, is to be seen in the experiment its authors 
are trying, of instituting New Saints' Days. My 
Right Rev. correspondent does not require to be in- 
formed that they have (in imitation of the Papists) 
set apart a day to the religious commemoration of 
Bishop Ken, and even constructed and published a 
Matin Service for Bishop Ken's Day, " formed 
apparently (says the Bishop of Exeter) on the model 
of an office in the Breviary to a Romish saint. Would 
it be safe for the Church itself (the Bishop pro- 
ceeds) — and is it becoming in private individuals — 
to pronounce thus confidently on the characters of 



( 72 ) 

deceased Christians — in other words, to assume the 
gift of ' discerning spirits ?' To what must such a 
practice be expected to lead ? The history of the 
Church of Rome has told us, and the fathers of our 
Reformation, in compiling the Liturgy, have marked 
their sense of the danger, by rejecting every portion 
of the Breviary which bears on such a practice, even 
while they adopted all that was really sound and edi- 
fying in it. Yet these writers scruple not to recom- 
mend this very practice thus deliberately rejected by 
those wise and holy men, and, strange to say, re- 
commend it as ( only completing what our Reformers 
have begun. 5 " 

This move is certainly a bold one for these cau- 
tious leaders. No wonder some of their friends are 
startled by it. But perhaps they know best what 
the public mind will bear, and how rapidly it will 
answer to unfold the system. You or I may live to 
see the "English Calendar," not filled up, indeed, 
like the "Roman/' with a Saint for every day in 
the year, but studded with a score or two of goodly 
names — each with its "Matin" or "Vesper" Ser- 
vice. How curious it would be, should Archbishop 
Laud's name happen to be elevated to the niche ad- 
joining Bishop Ken's. No candidate for canoniza- 
tion would probably poll as many votes at the Uni- 
versity just now. And yet it may be doubted whether 
the laity of the Church of England, are quite pre- 
pared for such an addition to their tutelary deities. 

The Bishop of Exeter further censures the Tractists 
for the gentle terms in which they treat of "some of 
the worst corruptions of Popery:" — "for instance, 
the Invocation of Saints and the Worship of 



( 73 ) 

images." I do not charge them with advocating these 
practices, but they are far from dealing with them in 
the ordinary style of Protestants. And one of them, 
the late Mr. Froude, already mentioned, whose ' Re- 
mains ' were edited at Oxford, says, "I think people 
are injudicious to talk against Roman Catholics for 
worshipping of saints, and honouring the Virgin and 
Images, &c. These things may perhaps be idola- 
trous, I cannot make up my mind about it." 

In Tract 71, p. 7, the writers recommend that 
"we should put into the back ground the controversy 
about the Holy Eucharist, which is almost certain to 
lead to profane and rationalistic thoughts in the minds 
of many, and cannot well be discussed in words at all, 
without the sacrifice of "godly fear;" — "as if (sub- 
joins the Bishop already quoted so freely) that tenet. 
(transubstantiation) were not the abundant source of 
enormous practical evils, which the faithful advocate 
of truth is bound to expose." — One is ready to sus- 
pect that there must be some other motive than the 
one here assigned, for wishing to arrest the contro- 
versy about transubstantiation. I offer no conjecture 
as to what it is ; but there is a sentence or two in 
Knox and Jebb's Correspondence (a work which 
contains not merely the « germs' of this system, but, 
in some particulars, a fuller development of it than 
we have yet been favoured with in the Tracts,) which 
I beg leave to quote on this point. " Deep measures 
(says Mr. Knox,) have been taken for making our 
re-union (the Church of England with the Roman 
Catholic Church,) practicable, in the fulness of time ; 
but little less deep measures have also been taken, 
for keeping it off until that time should be ; fully 



( 74 ) 

come.' Such a measure I take to be the decree of 
the Council of Late ran in the year (I think) 1215, 
under Innocent III. Until then the actual tenet of 
transubstantiation had not been enjoined, and the 
believer in the real presence was equally catholic, 
whether he did, or did not, suppose a change in the 
substance of the elements .... I am ready to think 
this will prove our last remaining barrier to coalescence"* 
(Letter 94.) 

This brings me to the doctrine of the Real 
Presence. The Tractists deny transubstantiation, 
but they hold that the real body and blood of Christ 
are present in the eucharist. This is implied when 
they tell us that the ministry in the line of " apos- 
tolical succession," have been intrusted with "the aw- 
ful and mysterious gift of making the bread and w\ne 3 
Christ's body and blood;" and affirm that their Church 
is " the only Church in this (the British) realm, 

WHICH HAS A RIGHT TO BE QUITE SURE THAT SHE HAS 

the Lord's body to give to his people." (Tract 
4, p. 26.) But in Tract 27, (from Bishop Cosin) 
the language is explicit, as the following extracts will 
show. " We hold by a firm belief that it is the body 
of Christ; of the manner how it becomes so, there is 
not a word in the Gospel We believe a real pre- 
sence no less than you (the Romanists) do." " If it 

* I hope the Editor of the Churchman had no reference to this 
passage, when he contended, in his late controversy with the 
Catholic Herald, that the dogma of transubstantiation in its true 
and primitive import, had been abandoned by nearly all the Ro- 
man Catholics of the present day ? The Romanist officiously 
called for his " proofs " — a call that has been found, it is appre- 
hended, a little embarrassing. 



( 75 ) 

seems impossible that the flesh of Christ should de- 
scend, and become our food, through so great a distance, 
we must remember how much the power of the Holy- 
Spirit exceeds our sense and our apprehensions .... 
and so make our faith to receive and believe, what 

our reason cannot comprehend In this mystical 

eating, by the wonderful power of the Holy Ghost, 
we do invisibly receive the substance of Christ's body 
and blood, as much as if we should eat and drink both 
visibly." He admits that " there is a conversion of the 
bread into the body of Christ" and says, that " the true 
body of Christ is not only shadowed and figured, but 
also given indeed and by worthy communicants duly 
received." 

But I will not multiply quotations. I am well 
aware that unguarded language was used on this sub- 
ject by some even of the Continental Reformers. 
But, I think, all unbiassed Protestants must see in the 
doctrine of the Tracts on this point, (especially when 
viewed in connexion with the rest of the system,) a 
strong Popish tendency. Nothing, certainly, could 
be more at variance than the sentiments just quoted, 
with the language of your 28th Article, which says, 
" The body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten in 
the Supper, only after an heavenly and spiritual man- 
ner." And plain readers will wonder that men who 
can put forth sentiments like these, should feel any 
great horror of transubstantiation. 

The only remaining feature of these Tracts I pro- 
pose to notice, is, their doctrine concerning the 
Rule of Faith. On this fundamental question, 
they side with the Church of Rome in maintaining 
the insufficiency of the Bible as a rule of faith, and 



( 76 ) 

the binding obligations of "Catholic traditions." 
That they differ from Rome as to what these tradi- 
tions are, is a matter of very subordinate moment. 
With her they hold, that the Bible cannot be under- 
stood without the aid of the church — nay, that "the 
church has ever been the primary source of faith." 
An inquirer "must go first to the Church" then, if he 
chooses, to the Bible. The Bible is, in the judgment 
of these writers, a very obscure book. Who would 
suppose that any one, except a Roman Catholic, could 
speak of the Holy Scriptures in terms like these? 
" If Scripture contains any religious system at all, it 
must contain it covertly, and teach it obscurely, be- 
cause it is altogether most immethodical and irregu- 
lar in its structure." (Tract 85.*) Again; "I own 
it seems to me, judging antecedently, very improba- 
ble, indeed, that it (the Bible) should contain the 
whole of the revealed word of God. . . We do not 
look into Scripture for a complete history of the se- 
cular matters which it mentions; why should we 
look for a complete account of religious truth ? . . . 
Both the history of its composition and its internal 
structure, are against its being a complete depository 
of the Divine will, unless the early church says it is. 
Now, the early church does not tell us this. It does 
not seem to have considered that a complete code of 
morals (/) or of Church government, or of rites, or 
of discipline, is in Scripture." (This is, indeed, 
"'rancid Popery," as Dr. Beasley calls it.) Again, 
of the doctrines of the faith, this writer says, (in the 
same Tract,) " the wonder is that they are all there, 

* I have not this Tract at hand, and quote through another 
writer. 



( 77 ) 

or can be gained indirectly from Scripture : humanly 
judging, they would not be there but for God's inter- 
position ; and, therefore, since they are there by a 
sort of accident, it is not strange they should be la- 
tent there, and only indirectly producible thence. 
God effects his greatest ends by apparent accidents." 
Is not this intolerable from a professed believer in 
the Scriptures? from a minister of the Gospel? from 
a signer of those articles which say, not that the Bi- 
ble is to be received and believed because it may be 
proved by the creeds, but that the creeds are to be 
" received and believed/' because " they may be 
proved by most certain warrants of Holy Scripture?" 
(See your 8th Art.) 

The Book which God mercifully gave us, to be 
" a lamp to our feet, and a light to our path," having 
proved so inadequate, another guide must be sub- 
stituted in its slead. Accordingly, we are informed, 
(see British Critic, vol. 24, p. 254,) that " the church 
is, in matter of fact, our great divinely appointed guide 
into saving truth, under divine grace, whatever may 
be the abstract power or sufficiency of the Bible." 
Mr. Keble, also, (according to the Christian Ob- 
server,) maintained, in his visitation sermon, that 
"church tradition is parallel to Scripture, not de- 
rived from it ;" that " it fixes the interpretation of 
disputed texts by authority of the Holy Spirit;" and 
that " we are as much bound to defer to tradition as 
to the written word of God, which he has been 
pleased to give us over and above." Is this Protes- 
tant (or, if you will, Reformed) Christianity? Or is 
it Popery? 

It is not surprising that the advocates of these 

7* 



( 78 ) 

principles, should be engaged in a systematic effort, 
both in England and this country, to discredit Chil- 
lingworth. These gentlemen see that his great work, 
" The Religion of Protestants, a safe way to salva- 
tion," is, in some of its leading principles, as much 
in the way of their success, as it has been in that of 
Rome. And they have joined Rome in her effort to 
overthrow it. It has withstood her assaults for two 
hundred years : the sequel will show whether her 
new allies will be able (even by the mining process 
they are resorting to,) to prostrate this noble bul- 
wark of Protestantism. That they come to the en- 
terprise with a zest, is evident, as well from their 
ungenerous attacks upon the reputation of Chilling- 
worth, as from the thrusts they make on all occa- 
sions at his favourite maxim, " The Bible, the Bible 
only is the religion of Protestants." See examples 
in Mr. Keble's sermon, and in the British Critic pas- 
sim. This latter work, indeed, gives us a morceau 
from one of Mr. Froude's letters, (a man whose 
frankness every one must respect, however we may 
revolt at his errors,) in which he repudiates the 
Scriptures as a guide even in fundamentals. " Your 
trumpery principle (he observes) about ' Scripture 
being the sole rule of faith in fundamentals,' (I nau- 
seate the word,) is but a mutilated edition of the 
Protestant principle of 'the Bible, and the Bible 
only is the religion of Protestants/ without the 
breadth and axiomatic character of the original.' " 
"Bible religion," is an offence to these gentlemen. 
They " cannot away with it." It is too simple in 
its doctrines, its order, its worship. Hence we hear 
one who was as much the god-father as Knox was 



( 79 ) 

the father of the system, exclaiming, "// is my wish 
and prayer that I may be saved from the simplicity of 
Bible religion!"* What a prayer for a Christian 
Bishop ! 

These writers, it is true, do not adopt the Romish 
doctrine of the rule of faith in all particulars : but 
the points on which they are at issue, are quite se- 
condary, in importance, to those in which they 
agree. The following principles, for example, are 
(as I understand them) common to the two systems: 

1. The Bible is not a sufficient rule of faith and 
practice. 

2. Catholic tradition is of equal authority with 
the written word. 

3. The Church is "the primary source of faith." 

4. The Church is the only authorized expounder 
of the Scriptures. 

5. Controversies of faith are to be ultimately de- 
termined by an appeal, not to the Scriptures, but to 
Catholic tradition. 

I submit whether these principles do not imbody 
the essence of the Popish dogma on this great ques- 
tion? 

It is not my object to argue the points involved 
in this question, but I cannot refrain from adding two 
or three sentences from an admirable address on the 
rule of faith, delivered in 1827, by one of the high 
dignitaries of the established church, the Archbishop 
of Dublin. 

" If Scripture be the word of God, intended for 
our direction; and if, as such, it contains all things 
necessary to our salvation ; and contains them like- 

* Bishop Jebb in his 126th Letter to Knox. 



( 80 ) 

wise with sufficient plainness, [positions he had esta- 
blished in the context,] — it is manifestly a full and 
sufficient rule for the faith and practice of Christians; 
and there can be none other, by which we should be 
governed, but this alone." After stating the Romish 
doctrine of tradition, he resumes : " Thus, an un- 
written tradition is made necessary to supply the de^ 
fects and to illustrate the obscurities of the written 
word of God. And, consequently, that church, 
which professes to be the keeper and dispenser of 
this tradition, becomes the only interpreter of the 
Christian revelation — it holds in its hands all the se^ 
crets of the Divine counsels — rits rules constitute the 
true measure of our faith and practice, and its au- 
thority forms the immediate and true ground of 

Christian obligation What is this but 

putting the decrees of men in place of the oracles of 
God, dispossessing our Lord and Saviour of the su- 
premacy over his church, displacing that church from 
the foundation which has been laid, and attempting 
to erect it upon one removed to the greatest con- 
ceivable distance from the foundation of Jesus 
Christ?" 

These remarks, I am aware, apply in their full 
extent only to the Papal doctrine; but they apply 
substantially to the Oxford school, as having adopted 
the main principle of that doctrine. With this prin- 
ciple Rome set out, but she could not maintain her- 
self without adding other corruptions to it. Is there 
any reason to believe it will fare better with Ox- 
ford? 

I have thus endeavoured, Right Reverend Sir, to es- 
tablish the main position of the obnoxious passage in 



( 81 ) 

my Lecture, to wit : that the Oxford Divinity im- 
bodies " some of the worst errors of Popery." If 
my time and your patience would permit, I would 
furnish additional proofs, and bring out more promi- 
nently some features of the system, which have been 
only glanced at. But I am satisfied to rest the case 
here, and to leave it to the readers of our correspon- 
dence to decide whether the charge which I, in com- 
mon with so many others, have brought against these 
tracts, is without any foundation. 

The other points submitted by you are of second- 
ary importance, and can be more summarily disposed 
of. One of them relates to the efforts which, it is 
alleged in my Lecture, the Oxfordists are making 
in England to disseminate their doctrines, and to 
the measure of success with which these efforts have 
been attended. On this subject I have only to say, 
that it is a matter of general notoriety that the Wri- 
ters in question "are employing both the pulpit and 
the press, to give their publications currency among 
the people." No one who sees the British Critic, or 
reads the quarterly list of new works from the Ox- 
ford press, can be in doubt on this point. And the 
Tractists themselves inform us in their second vol- 
ume, that "there has been much hearty and intelli- 
gent adoption " of the " primitive views " advocated 
by them. Another writer, also, (Mr. Baden Powell) 
is quoted by the Critic as having stated in a recent 
pamphlet, that these sentiments " have been exten- 
sively adopted and strenuously upheld, and are daily 
gaining ground among a considerable and influential 
portion of the members, as well as ministers, of the 
established Church." — But this is one of the points 



( 82 ) 

on which we shall doubtless agree, and I will not 
dwell on it. 

The other part of my statement, which you call 
upon me to substantiate, is in the following words: — 
" The Oxford Tract leaven is already beginning to 
work in our cities ; and Roman priests are publicly 
felicitating their people, on the progress their doc- 
trines are making in the bosom of a Protestant 
Church/' You have made up an issue on the latter 
part of this sentence, to which I might fairly except. 
You call upon me to prove that the Popish doctrines 
of the Oxford system have made such progress in 
your church, as to " authorize " the Roman priests 
to congratulate their people on the event. This is 
not what I asserted. I stated a simple fact. As to 
2Jroving that fact, I presume my word is a sufficient 
voucher for it. But if you see the Roman Catholic 
papers (as I take it for granted you do,) you have all 
the " proof " of my statement, which could reasonably 
be desired — though (allow me to add) you have not 
all on which the statement was actually founded. 

But (to eome to the merits of the case) the whole 
question presented by the language of the Lecture, as 
quoted above and modified by the note (which is 
copied into my first lecture,) resolves itself into this, 
viz : whether the Oxford system, as a system, has 
made any progress in our cities ? If it has, then, on 
the supposition that it is strongly imbued with Po- 
pery, (a point already examined,) the Popery that is 
in it, has made progress also. 

In the note just alluded to, I have expressed the 
opinion — an opinion founded on the testimony of 
intelligent Protestant Episcopalians — that " the cir- 



( 83 ) 

dilation of these pernicious writings " (the Oxford 
publications) was likely to be kept " within very nar- 
row limits." I cordially hope this may be the case. 
Still, there is not wanting evidence to show that the 
"leaven" has been introduced. In proof of this, I 
need but refer to the support which specific errors 
of the system have received from leading periodicals, 
and the exertions that have been made to circulate 
the tracts. 

Whatever may be the character of these publica- 
tions, whether Protestant or Popish, or neither, it will 
not be denied that active measures have been taken to 
disseminate them. I am aware that it is customary to 
commend these " calumniated writings," with some 
reservation. The right of any individual to do this, 
is indisputable. But it is not easy to see how one 
can recommend a series of works to the public, if he 
believes they contain any serious error. There may 
be many sound and excellent sentiments in the Koran, 
in the " Fratres Poloni," in the works of Belsham or 
Channing, — but what pious and judicious man would 
advise the indiscriminate purchase and study of these 
books? Nay, what conscientious religious teacher 
would promote the circulation of a work which he 
believed to be pervaded with any one important er- 
ror? It involves a serious imputation upon the cha- 
racters of the clergymen who lend their influence to 
scatter the Oxford writings through the church, to 
admit the supposition for a moment, that they can 
regard the errors they may contain, in any other light 
than as very trivial blemishes. — But let me cite a 
few testimonies, to illustrate the estimate in which 
the Oxford Divinity is held in this country. This 



( 84 ) 

is, I am sure, quite a work of supererogation; and in- 
stead of going into it in detail, I shall quote a few 
statements and facts from the " Churchman" (to 
come no nearer home,) and then respectfully refer 
my correspondent for further information, to the 
columns of that paper, passim, for the last eighteen 
months. 

A correspondent of the Churchman thus repudi- 
ates, like his brethren at Oxford, the name " Protes- 
tant Episcopalian:" — " In the argument which I of- 
fered in your last, I must confess my chagrin at the 
use of the word Episcopalians. How can we blame 
those who are ignorant of Catholic principles for 
confounding us with the numerous sects of the age, 
while we sanction and encourage the delusion by 
taking to ourselves the inadequate designation of 
Protestant Episcopalians?" 

" For one, I am willing to serve under the banner 
of the church, but not under the flag of a sect; I claim 
my right to be known as a Catholic, and I complain 
of the wrong which is done me by a name which 
does not represent my character, feelings or prin- 
ciples, and which obliges me to belie my profession, 
and appear to the world in a false character." 

What a mortal antipathy this school have to the 
word " Protestant." It seems, with them, to taint 
every thing it touches. 

A late No. of the same paper has the following 
effusion from the pen of Dodwell, a writer quoted 
with much favour in the Oxford Tracts. Whether 
the editor joins with this arrogant writer, in the sum- 
mary disposition he makes of all non-Episcopalians, 
I do not know. Happily for us, our eternal destiny 



( 85 ) 

is not suspended upon the dictum of a poor fellow- 
mortal so much a stranger to the true spirit of Christi- 
anity, as to give utterance to sentiments like these : — 

" None but the bishops can unite us to the Father 
and the Son. Whence it will follow that whosoever 
is disunited from the visible communion of the church 
on earth, and particularly from that visible commu- 
nion of the bishops, must consequently be disunited 
from the whole visible Catholic Church on earth; and 
not only so, but from the invisible communion of the 
holy angels and saints in heaven, and, what is yet 
more, from Christ and God himself. It is one of 
the most dreadful aggravations of the condition of 
the damned, that they are banished from the pre- 
sence of the Lord and the glory of his power. The 
same is their condition also, who are disunited from 
Christ by being disunited from his visible represen- 
tative." 

A correspondent, in the same No., gives us Dod- 
welFs doctrine over again: — 

" None but the bishops can unite us to the Fa- 
ther, in the way of Christ's appointment, and these 
bishops must be such as receive their mission from 
the first commissioned apostles: wherever such bish- 
ops are found dispensing the faith and sacraments of 
Christ, there is a true church : unsound it may be, 
like the Church of Rome, but still a true or real 
church, as a sick or diseased man, though unsound, 
is still a real or true man." 

The Churchman, it is manifest, then, is quite up to 
the Oxford standard, on the subject of church power 
and the apostolical succession. — It is equally explicit 
respecting the real presence; and even subscribes to 



( S6 ) 

the doctrine that " the elements are converted into 
the very body and very blood of the Redeemer." 
In Nov. 1839, several queries were propounded to 
the editor, by " Warburton," in relation to the senti- 
ments taught in the Oxford Tracts. In answer to 
the first question, he says, " We reply without hesi- 
tation that the Tracts teach not only the virtual, but 
the real and substantial presence of Christ in the sa- 
crament. In saying this, however, we wish to say 
as distinctly, that they totally discard the dogma of 
transubstantiation, as propounded by the Council of 
Trent: nor, so far as we have seen, do they give the 
least countenance to any refined modification of that 
doctrine. And whereas "Warburton" supposes that 
if they deny transubstantiation, as commonly under- 
stood, they yet teach the change of the elements into 
what he calls a tertium quid, we desire to add our 
belief that he does them great injustice in imputing to 
them any such folly or irreverence. On the contrary, 
they, in some places, teach distinctly the conver- 
sion of the elements into the very body and very 
blood of the Redeemer." He subsequently adds, 
u To the doctrine of the real presence as stated in 
our answer to Warburton's first query, we cordially 
accede." 

One of his papers, for the same month, contains a 
long article from the "British Magazine," (one of 
the Oxford organs,) advocating Prayers for the 
dead. The editor thus expresses what he supposes 
to be the opinion of the Tractists (and what is doubt- 
less his own) on this subject: — "We doubt whether 
we should be justified in saying that they recom- 
mend the offering of prayer for the faithful depart- 



( 87 ) 

ed; although they would probably adopt with appro- 
bation the language of a bishop of the American 
Church, and 'lament that the Church of Rome, by 
grafting the absurd errors of purgatory , and prayers 
to departed saints, instead of for them, on this old, 
and pious, and Catholic Christian doctrine, hath al- 
most banished it out of the minds of Protestant 
Christians.' " 

How far the editor coincides with the Oxfordists 
on the fundamental doctrines of justification, rege- 
neration, the nature and desert of sin, and their affili- 
ated points, together with the opus operatum effi- 
cacy of Baptism, may be gathered from his laudatory 
notice of Dr. Pusey's Treatise on Baptism, (form- 
ing Vol. II. of the Tracts,) in which these subjects 
are discussed. We have, in his notice, an example 
of the " reserve " so frequently exhibited on this 
side the Atlantic, in endorsing the new Divinity ; 
but the feeble note of dissent that meets us in the 
third sentence, seems (and v/ith reason,) ashamed to 
utter its tiny voice in the midst of the swelling ac- 
clamations which go up on either side of it. 

"Baptismal Privileges. — It is refreshing to 
turn from the cheerless and shrivelling theology of 
the day, to the expanded and ennobling views of our 
holy calling which Dr. Pusey has opened to us, in 
his admirable treatise on Baptism. We have read 
enough of this treatise to be satisfied that it is re- 
plete with pure, primitive, and truly scriptural doc- 
trine. The points on which its correctness may, on 
solid grounds, be reasonably questioned, are as no- 
thing compared with the broad, Catholic and scrip- 
tural principles which it develops with surprising 



( 88 ) 

fulness, and advocates with a chastened zeal. We 
consider it the most extraordinary theological work 
of the age; and as it is divested of technicalities, and 
adapted to laymen as well as professional readers, we 
trust that it will find its way into every family in the 
Church. If the author seem to his readers to attach 
too great importance to what they perhaps are ac- 
customed to regard as merely a significant ceremony? 
let them see whether he have not scriptural authority 
for his views ; and if they still falter, let them think 
whether any too great things can be said of blessings 
conveyed to us by the sacrament, which the Re- 
deemer has appointed as the seal and symbol of the 
redemption of mankind." — (Churchman of May 9th, 
1840.) 

I subjoin a single sentence, from the same source, 
on the rule of faith: — "It will be well for the 
reader of Chillingworth to bear in mind the unques- 
tioned fact, that the Church, and not the Scrip- 
tures, is the primary source of the faith; and that 
the writings of the New Testament were produced 
as emergencies required, and serve the purpose ra- 
ther of a safeguard against error than of a first ini- 
tiation into the faith of Christ." He elsewhere in- 
sists on the authority of tradition, in harmony with 
the Tract writers. 

But I need not dwell on particulars. We have 
testimony, which covers the whole ground, in a very 
few words. The great question about the Oxford 
publications, is, whether they are imbued with Po- 
pery. We are assured by this paper, that they are 
not only free from Popery, but even from any " ten- 
dency " to it. The Editor (in commenting on Dr. 



( 89 ) 

Pusey's letter to the Bishop of Oxford) puts his im- 
primatur upon them thus : — " The members of our 
own Church who have been inclined to accede ge- 
nerally to the views set forth in the Tracts, but 
have feared that there might be some foundation for 
the violent and sweeping charges which have been 
brought against their authors, may now consider 
their fears as effectually at rest. Every suspicion ■ 
even of a tendency to Romanism, in the Oxford 
Divines, is removed." 

The explicitness of this language leaves nothing 
further to be desired in the way of proof. In the judg- 
ment of one of your leading journals, the passages 
cited in this letter (I refer to these as a sample mere- 
ly,) from the Oxford writings, on the power of the 
priesthood,* the efficacy of the sacraments, baptismal 

* One of the powers claimed for the priesthood at Oxford, in 
as extravagant a degree as at Rome, has not been adverted to in 
this letter — I mean the power of absolution. A single illustration 
of it is all I can introduce here: and this imports (if I understand 
it) that in the opinion of these writers, it is at least doubtful 
whether a penitent sinner can obtain forgiveness through the 
blood of Christ, without absolution from a priest. — On p. 128 of 
his treatise on Baptism, Dr. Pusey quotes a brief narrative from 
the late excellent Mr. Williams, of the South Sea Islands Mis- 
sion, the purport of which is this. Mr. W. was called to see a 
sick woman, (a member of the church, as I interpret his language,) 
who was in great distress of mind, on account of infanticides of 
which she had been guilty when a heathen. " I directed her (he 
observes) to the " faithful saying, that Christ Jesus came into the 
world to save sinners." This imparted a little comfort, and after 
visiting her frequently, and directing her thoughts to that blood 
which cleanseth from all sin, I succeeded, by the blessing of God, 
in tranquillizing her troubled spirit: and she died about eight days 
after my first interview, animated with the hope, that her sins, 
though many, would all be forgiven her. And what but the Gos- 

8* 



( 90 ) 

justification and renewal, the office of saving faith, the 
distinction of mortal and venial sins, the possibility 
of forgiveness for post-baptismal sins, the subordinate 
position of the doctrine of the atonement and the 
preaching of the Gospel, in the means of grace, the 
real presence, prayers for the dead, the institution of 
new saints' days, the insufficiency of the Bible as a 
rule of faith, the authority of tradition, together with 
the marked antipathy of the Tractists to the various 
Protestant denominations, their sneers at the Refor- 
mation, and their habitual tone of deference and affec- 
tion towards the church of Rome — the language of 
the Tracts on all these points, contains nothing to 
justify the bare "suspicion of even a tendency to 
Romanism !" 

It certainly will not now be an open question 
among American Protestants, whether the " leaven " 
of this divinity " is beginning to work in our cities." 
How widely it will diffuse itself, is known only to 
Him who knoweth all things. Its fruits, however, 
will doubtless develope themselves with the system. 
Indeed, some have appeared already. May I respect- 
fully commend a single fact to your attention? I 

pel could have brought such consolation?" — On this statement. 
Dr. Pusey remarks, " Consolation is not the main object of the 
Gospel, yet the Gospel would have brought much more conso- 
lation, had this teacher known it all, and could have told her 
of the " one Baptism for the remission of sins," that she " had 
been washed, had been cleansed;" and so could he have declared 
authoritatively, without altering our Lord's own words, " Thy 
sins are forgiven." — Here not only is baptism made a ground of 
confidence that our sins are forgiven, but the clergy are assumed 
to have the prerogative of authoritatively (for the word "are" 
is made emphatic by Dr. Pusey,) pronouncing the remission of 
sins. Does Rome go beyond this? 



( 91 ) 

know of an instance in which a family of the highest 
respectability, have been converted to Popery ', chief- 
ly by the reading of the Oxford j)ublications. Can 
a system which leads to such results, be free from 
"any tendency to Romanism?" Can a good tree 
bring forth such corrupt fruit? It does really appear 
to me, Sir, (if I may be allowed to express a private 
opinion,) that facts like this ought to make serious 
Episcopalians, who may have inadvertently counte- 
nanced this system, pause and consider whether they 
are not promoting a scheme which will be likely, in 
the end, to seduce many nominal Protestants into the 
church of Rome. Can a series of writings be adapt- 
ed to advance the interests of true religion, which are 
already " overthrowing the faith of some," and the re- 
publication of which, in this country, was warmly en- 
couraged by the Roman Catholics, on the ground 
(to use their own language) that many Protestants 
" would find in their pages doctrines so un-protestant 
as would lead them to examine the grounds on which 
they were asserted, and so consonant with the faith 
and practice of the Catholic church," as would even- 
tually bring them back into her fold? 

Such, Right Reverend Sir, are some of the grounds 
on which the statements in my Lecture, respecting 
the Oxford Divinity, must rest for their vindication. 
I flatter myself that I shall be exonerated, in the 
view of impartial men of all denominations, from the 
imputation of having spoken either unadvisedly or 
uncharitably, in alleging that there are " some of the 
worst errors of Popery " incorporated with that sys- 
tem. Or, if I have erred, it will not, I am persuaded, 



( 92 ) 

be accounted as a " mortal " sin, when it is consid- 
ered not only that the Roman Catholics themselves 
have fallen into the same misconception as to the 
character of the system, but that all that I have 
charged upon it has been charged before, by distin- 
guished clergymen of the Protestant Episcopal 
Church, both in England and America. This is 
shown in my first letter, and might be confirmed by 
the testimony of the excellent Bishop of Chester, 
(one of the ablest prelates of the establishment,) 
who says, "this subject [Oxfordism] is daily as- 
suming a more serious and alarming aspect, and 
threatens a revival of the worst evils of the Romish 
system. Under the specious pretence (he adds) of 
deference to antiquity, and respect for primitive mo- 
dels, the foundations of our Protestant Church are 
undermined by men who dwell within her walls, and 
those who sit in the Reformers' seat are traducing 
the Reformation."* 

I am not ignorant of the plea which is set up by 
these write is, when the charge of Popery is advanced 
against their publications. They tell us, with all 
conceivable gravity, that the dogmas and usages which 
have excited so much alarm within your communion, 
on both sides the water, are not Popery, but "Ancient 
Christianity." They were in the church before the 
rise of the Papal power, and, therefore, they are no part 
of that system, but among those "Catholic verities " 
and truly apostolic customs, which are to be received 
by the universal church. 1 confess, I think the logic of 
this argument is bad, and the doctrine worse. As to the 

* Charge of the Bishop of Chester, p. 2. 



( 93 ) 

logic, it is surely a non-sequitur to say, that because 
an error existed in the church before the Bishop 
of Rome usurped the title and dignities of Supreme 
Pontiff, it cannot be a part of Popery. And as to 
the doctrine, see what it must lead to. Instead of 
taking the Saviour and his apostles for our guides, 
we are to be governed by the teaching and example of 
the Fathers — by men who made no claim to inspi- 
ration, and who were as liable to err as good men in 
any other period of the world. That the history of the 
early church is full of instruction — that great defer- 
ence is due to the opinions of the illustrious men 
whose names adorn the annals of the first four cen- 
turies — that their testimony to the essential truths 
of Christianity is a precious legacy to the pious of 
all generations — and that much information may be 
drawn from their writings, of high value in the inter- 
pretation of the sacred volume — all this will be grant- 
ed by every enlightened Christian. But still they 
were fallible men ; and to concede to them, however 
distinguished for learning or sanctity, the authority 
which is claimed for them by the Oxford Divines, is 
(it is conceived) to rob the Bible of its just pre-emi- 
nence, and to open the flood-gates of error into the 
church. The Oxford writers encourage clerical celi- 
bacy — monastic seclusion — prayers for the dead — the 
giving of the eucharist to infants and to dying per- 
sons even when insensible. And when we ask for 
their warrant, they point us, not " to the law and the 
testimony " — to prophets and apostles — but to " An- 
cient Christianity." So, they teach baptismal 
justification and regeneration — the real presence — the 
power of absolution as vested in the priesthood — the 



( 94 ) 

co-ordinate authority of tradition with the Bible, as the 
rule of faith. And here, again, they refer us for their 
warrant to "Ancient Christianity." In this way, 
they are bringing into the church " some of the worst 
errors of Popery." Yes, of Popery: — for the Apostle, 
in his most formal prediction of the great apostacy, ex- 
pressly assures us that its elements were in the 
church even in his time. "The mystery of iniquity 
(he says) doth already work." (2 Thess. ii. 7.) Its 
seeds were already sown; nay, they were beginning 
to germinate. The evil could not be fully developed 
until the great obstacle alluded to by him in the same 
verse (and which is commonly supposed to have 
been the Roman Empire) was " taken out of the 
way." But it might continue to increase, and doubt- 
less it did increase, day by day, until that time ar- 
rived. Who that has traced the rise and progress of 
the apostacy can doubt, that the apostle in the above 
cited passage, had his eye (inter alia) upon those very 
heresies and corruptions enumerated a moment ago — - 
the elements of Popery that were then " working," and 
which were, on the fall of the Roman Empire, or- 
ganized into that grand system of iniquity that the 
world has been cursed with ever since? And yet, 
forsooth, because these excrescences were found (or 
rather, are alleged to have been found, for, as to some 
of them, we may well stand in doubt,) upon the an- 
cient church, we are bound to gather them up, and 
put them among our jew r els, and enshrine them in 
our hearts, and guard them as we guard the precious 
doctrines of God's holy word ! 

Nor is this the whole of the process by which 
these gentlemen are, unwittingly, perhaps, but real- 



( 95 ) 

ly, assimilating the church to Popery. They are 
tearing down with one hand, as well as building up 
with the other. It is. not enough for them to bring 
out of the Papal Church some of her worst cor- 
ruptions, and stamp them with the magic words, 
" Ancient Christianity," and send them forth 
into the world as standard coinage, (vainly ima- 
gining that this specious label will give them cur- 
rency, though the King's < image and superscription' 
be wanting ;) but they are laying hold of glorious doc- 
trines which bear his impress, and striving to efface it. 
They come into the Reformed Church, and sacrile- 
giously strike down, one after another, its grand, dis^ 
tinctive principles-^-those principles which make it 
what it is, and by which it has, under God, achieved 
its triumphs. Their watch-word, or rather, I should 
say, their catch-word, here, is "Ultra Protestant- 
ism." Wherever they can set their burning brand, 
they leave the odious capitals; whether with the same 
intent, I say not, but in the same way as in Eastern 
countries a sign is hung out upon infected houses to 
mark the presence of the Plague. The sufficiency 
of the Scriptures as a rule faith — -justification by the 
imputed righteousness of Christ — the preaching of 
the Gospel as the great means of salvation — the effi- 
cacy of the Redeemer's blood to " cleanse from all 
sin," — the nature of the sacraments, and the just au- 
thority of the ministry, as defined in the symbols of 
Reformed Christendom ; — on all these and other mo- 
mentous doctrines, they have put the base, insidious 
stigma, "Ultra Protestantism." Luther and Me- 
lancthon, Bucer and Zuingle, Calvin and Knox, the 
heroes of the " detestable reformation," are all ta- 



( 96 ) 

booed as "Ultra Protestants." Yea, if they 
could collect the ashes of England's sainted martyrs — 
of Cranmer and Ridley, Latimer and Hooper, and 
their illustrious compeers, they might, in full consis- 
tency with what they are daily asserting of the prin- 
ciples for which they died, engrave upon the hallow- 
ed urn, as a tribute of gratitude to their memories, 
the inscription "Ultra Protestants." 

Such (to the eye of a spectator, at least,) is the 
grand scheme by which the Oxford theologians are 
carrying forward their " second Reformation" — such 
the process by which they are casting up that famous 
"Via Media," of which they are so fond of dis- 
coursing. And yet, (what would be ludicrous but 
for the solemnity of the subject,) they profess to 
wonder that they should be suspected of Popery ! Do 
they think there is as little Protestantism left in the 
rest of Christendom, as there is at Oxford ? Or do 
they fancy that the Protestants of this age are so ig- 
norant of the features of Popery, that they do not 
know it when they see it — and even have it thrust 
upon them? True it is, the Protestantism of our day 
has sadly degenerated from the Protestantism of the 
Reformation. But it has vitality enough left to re- 
cognise the portrait that is here presented, notwith- 
standing the pains that have been taken to disguise it, 
and the venerable name it has usurped. And (if a 
stranger may hazard an opinion on a question which 
concerns mainly another communion,) the authors of 
this "movement" and their successors, will have 
many a hard-fought battle to go through, before they 
succeed in making the Protestant Episcopal church, 
as a body, fall down and worship the image of gold 



1 



( 97 ) 

and iron and clay, they are for setting up in their 
temples. 

The Protestant world will await with solicitude 
the " maturer developments " of the Oxford sy stem- 
That it is now in an inchoate state, is admitted on all 
hands. That it cannot remain stationary, must be 
manifest to every one who examines it : the u Via 
Media" has nothing but quicksands for its basis, 
and permanency is out of the question. Movement is 
indispensable: the only alternative is, " forward or 
backward?" Unhappily, there is little room to doubt 
which branch of the alternative will be chosen. It is 
painfully instructive to look through the "thirty years' 
correspondence " of Knox and Jebb, and note, as you 
go along, the onward progress of those gentlemen in 
error: and there is the same difference in the tone of the 
earlier and later productions of the men on whom their 
mantle has fallen. The fraternity are evidenty making 
progress : 

" Eunt obscuri sola sub nocte per umbras." 

Ever and anon we meet with some mysterious inti- 
mation in their writings, which stirs our expectations 
of great disclosures hereafter. For example, the Re- 
viewer of Carlyle's works, in a late No. of the Lon- 
don Quarterly, (an article " written, without a doubt, 
at Oxford," as you say of the article on " Roman- 
ism in Ireland," in the last No.*) in "hinting" at 

* You refer to this article as an evidence of the " bold cham- 
pionship " of Oxford against Rome. It certainly breathes a spirit 
of determined opposition to the Hierarchy, and abounds with start- 
ling facts. But all this may be, and yet the main position laid 
down in these letters be correct. The Roman Catholics have their 
9 



( 98 ) 

the " real cause why in this day it is so hard to ^kin- 
dle soul by soul/ and re-inspire mankind with the 
spirit of faith/' observes; "It would be well for those 
who are concerned in the government of man, whe- 
ther infant or adult — and it would cut at once the 
Gordian knot of ' national education ' — to think deep- 
ly on the problem, and to ask themselves steadi- 
ly and calmly, what is the meaning of a system 
of education carried on without a thought of the sa- 
craments of the church?" What does this mean? 
The writer makes no explanation, and leaves the un- 
initiated to divine the esoteric sense of the words, as 
they best can. — The numerous ' hints' of this kind 
scattered through the Oxford miscellanies, are doubt- 
less (to borrow Lord Bacon's descriptive phrase) the 
" seeds of things," which will in due time bring forth 
their appropriate fruit. And such seed, it is to be 
eared, will produce some bitter fruit for the friends 
of pure and undefiled religion. 

I am aware that the friends of the Oxford system 
repel observations of this sort, as a breach of charity ; 
and it is painful to feel obliged to make them. But 

own way of accounting for the hard names they get at Oxford 
sometimes. I will let one of them speak for himself. The editor of 
the London Tablet, (a R. C. Journal,) in his paper of January 
30th, says, " But there is another class of men who are em- 
barrassed by the narrowness of the strip of land which sepa- 
rates their territory from ours; who are drawn towards us by 
the irresistible evidence of truth, but hate us the more for being 
drawn against their will; who feel bound by interests or ne- 
cessity to protest against what they call our errors; but can hardly 
find language fine and delicate enough to distinguish our errors 
from their truths; and who feel that all the sleight of the most 
skilful posture-master can hardly enable them to maintain, with- 
out a fall, the attitude of contortion which they have chosen to 
assume, instead of the natural and unforced position of truth." 



( 99 ) 

who can forget the history of former errors which 
have desolated the church? Has not heresy always 
come in quietly and stealthily, in the very garb, some- 
times, of an angel of light? Look at the rise of 
Arianism — of Pelagianism — of Socinianism. Were 
they not all as specious — as professedly orthodox — 
as impatient of the imputation of heterodoxy — as is 
the system of Dr. Pusey and his coadjutors? And 
can it be wondered at that Protestants, with these 
facts before them, should predict that Oxfordism, un- 
less arrested soon, will become more and more assimi- 
lated to Popery? that they should fear its ultimate 
coalescence with that church which the adherents of 
the new divinity (or to speak more accurately, of the 
old divinity exhumed,) tell us, is "not only in the 
main orthodox" now, but " was ever distinguished as 
a pillar of the truth?"* It is my earnest prayer that 
these apprehensions may prove groundless — that the 
Oxford divines and their friends and successors in both 
countries, may be found " bold and able champions of 
the truth against the force and fraud" of Antichrist, 
in the day of conflict. That such a day is rapidly ap- 
proaching, is manifest alike from "the sure word of 
prophecy" and from the signs of the times. Pro- 
testant Christianity will need all her resources, in 
that encounter: she can ill afford to spare the church 
of England, or to have her come into the field rent with 
intestine feuds^ — still less can she afford to have a pow- 
erful division of her trained and gifted chivalry, throw 
themselves into the ranks of her adversary, or, like 

* " It (the church of Rome) must be in the main orthodox, as 
it is." " The Roman Catholic communion, whatever else it was 
or did, must be allowed this praise that it was ever distinguished 
as a pillar of the truth." (British Critic, Vol. 26, pp. 338, 64.) 



( ioo ) 

Meroz, stand aloof and refuse to go out with her 
consecrated hosts to battle. 

May it please God to ward off so heavy a calami- 
ty, and to preserve his Church, in all its branches, 
from the insidious devices and machinations of " that 
man of sin," "whose coming is after the working of 
Satan, with all power, and signs, and lying wonders." 

Thus, sir, I have endeavoured to lay before you, 
the information called for in your letter. Had it 
been decorous, I could have referred you for an an- 
swer to your inquiries, to many clergymen of high 
standing in your own communion, whose statements 
respecting the character of the Oxford Divinity, in 
perfect coincidence with the brief paragraph in my 
lecture, which occasioned your letter, and much 
more amplified, have long been before the public. 
But I fully recognise your right to make the requi- 
sition with which I have been honoured; and I felt 
that it was not only due to you and to myself, but to 
the cause of sound Christianity, to respond to it. My 
reply has been prepared in the midst of numerous 
engagements, incident to the pastoral charge of a 
large congregation; but, relying upon your candour 
to excuse its deficiencies, I submit it to your conside- 
ration, 

And remain, Right Reverend Sir, 
With much respect, 

Your friend and servant, 
H. A. BOARDMAN. 

Philadelphia, March 4th, 1841. 






ibs 



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BETWEEN THE 

RIGHT REV. BISHOP DOANE 

OP NEW JERSEY, 

AND THE 

REV. H. A. BOARDMAN 

OF PHILADELPHIA, 

ON THE 

ALLEGED POPISH CHARACTER 

OF THE 

OXFORD TRACTS, 



PHILADELPHIA : 

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1841. 



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ADVERTISEMENT. 



Books Published by Hooker $ Agnew. 

Ancient Christianity and the Doctrines of the 
Oxford Tracts, by Isaac Taylor, 

BOARDMAN ON ROMANISM. 

Rev. Henry Blunt's Complete Works, in 7 vols. 

Blunt's Lectures on the Life of Christ, 
in 1 vol. 12mo. 

Blunt's Lectures on the Life of St. Paul. 

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Blunt's Lectures on the Life of St. Pe- 
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Blunt's Lectures on the History of the 
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Blunt's Sermons. 



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Life of Simeon. Edited by the Right Reverend 

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Bickersteth on Baptism. 
Pictures of Religion. 
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